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masfmamms: 


COMPILATION  < 


NOTES  AND  MEMORANDA 


HKAUIXC    UrOX    THK    VHK    ()!•' 


HUMAN  ORDURE  AND  HUMAN  URINE 


RITES  OF  A  RELIGIOUS  OR  SEMI-RELIGIOUS  CHARACTER 


VARIOUS    NATIONS 


JOHN   G.    BOURKE.    Captain,    Third    Cavalry,    United  States  Army. 


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"^  PRINCETON,  N.  J.  \^ 


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Section . 


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COMPILATION  (       NOV  141! 


NOTES   AND  MEMORANDA 


HKAlUN(i    I  I'ON    TllK    ISIC    OK 


HUMAN  ORDURE  AND  HUMAN  URINE 


RITES  OF  A  RELIGIOUS  OR  SEMI-RELIGIOUS  CHARACTER 


VARIOUS    N  ATI  ONS. 
/ 

JOHN    G.    BOURKE.    Captain,    Third    Cavalry,    United  States  Army. 

FKI.I.DW    .IF    THK     AMERICAN    ASSOCIATION     FOK    THE   ADVANCEMENT   OF  SCIENCE;     MEMBER   OF   THE    ANTHROPO- 

LOOICAl   SOCIETY   OF   WASHINGTON,    D.    C.  ;  AUTHOR   OF  THE  "SNAKE   PANCE    OF   THE 

MOQUIS   OF   ARIZONA,"   "AN    APACHE    CAMPAIGN,"    ETC. 


WASHINGTON,   D.   C.  : 

1888. 


CONTENTS 


Page. 

Preliminary  observations 7 

The.  urine  dance  of  the  Zunis  of  New  Mexico 8-10 

Human  urine  drunk  by  Zunis — Human  ordure  and  excrement  of  dogs  eaten  by  Zunis — Refer- 
ence to  a  urine  dance  among  the  Bedouins  of  Arabia — The  use  of  urine  of  animals  among 
the  Parsis. 
The  Feast  of  Fools  in  Europe 10-12 

The  commemorative  character  of  religious  festivals 12, 13 

Godfrey  Higgins'  opinion — The  first  Crusaders  drank  their  own  urine  in  Bithynia — Dove's 
dung  sold  for  a  price  during  one  of  the  sieges  of  Samaria. 

Fray  Diego  Duran's  account  of  the  Mexican  festivals 13, 14 

Father  Geronimo  Boscana's  opinion  of  Indian  dances — Commemorative  dances  in  vogue  among 
Apaches,  Mojaves,  Zunis,  Moquis,  and  Sioux. 
The  urine  dance  of  the  Zunis  may  conserve  a  tradition  of  the  time  when  vile  ali- 
ment was  in  use 14, 15 

Excrement  used  in  human  food 15-19 

By  the  Indians  of  Florida,  Texas,  California,  British  America,  &c. 

The  Mexican  goddess  Suchiquecal  eats  ordure 18, 19 

The  Bacchic  orgies  of  the  Greeks 19 

Complicated  with  ophic  rites. 

Bacchic  orgies  in  North  America 19,  20 

Descriptions  by  Kane,  Bancroft,  and  Dall — Dogs  eaten  alive;  human  beings  bitten — Prince 
Wied's  account  of  such  orgies  among  the  Mandans — Such  orgies  possibly  commemorate  a 
former  condition  of  cannibalism. 

The  sacrifice  of  the  dog  a  substitute  for  human  sacrifice 20,21 

Urine  in  human  food 21 

"  Chinook  olives  "  described  by  Paul  Kane  and  by  Herbert  Spencer. 
Urine  used  in  bread-making __         21 

By  the  Moquis  of  Arizona,  according  to  Beadle. 
Urine  used  in  the  manufacture  of  salt 21 

By  the  Indians  of  Bogota,  according  to  G6mara. 
Siberian  hospitality 21,  22 

Women  offered  to  strangers,  who  must  drink  their  urine — Dulaure's  account  of  this  strange 
custom — A  novel  wedding  custom  noticed  in  Africa  by  Mungo  Park  ;  urine  of  brides  sprinkled 
upon  the  wedding  guests. 

Poisonous  fungi  used  in  ur-orgies 22 

By  the  Indians  of  Cape  Flattery  and  by  tlie  Shamans  of  Siberia — Accounts  of  Kennard,  Dr. 
Kingsley,  Schultze,  and  George  Kennan. 

A  similar  use  of  fungi  quite  probably  existed  among  the  Mexicans 23-25 

Mushrooms  and  toadstools  said  to  have  been  worshiped  by  the  North  American 

Indians 25 

A  former  use  of  fungus  indicated  in  the  myths  of  Ceylon  and  in  the  laws  of  the 

Brahmins 25,  26 

An  inquiry  into  the  Druidical  use  of  the  mistletoe 26-29 

Medicinal  qualities  attributed  to  the  mistletoe,  as  ascertained  from  various  authorities — Hindoo 
women  seem  to  use  it  secretly — The  phallic  derivation  of  the  custom  of  kissing  under  the 
mistletoe  bough — Concluding  remarks. 
The  mistletoe  festival  of  the  Mexicans  29 

As  decribed  by  Diego  Duran. 


6  CONTENTS. 

Page. 

Cow  cluug  and  cow  urine  in  religion 30,  31 

Sioux  and  Assinniboines  swear  upon  pieces  of  dried  buffalo  dung. 

Cow  dung  in  the  religious  ceremonies  of  the  Israelites 31 

Human  ordure  mingled  in  the  food  of  the  Israelites 31,  32 

Cow  dung  afterward  substituted. 

Offerings  of  dung  placed  upon  the  altars  of  the  Assyrian  Venus 32,  33 

The  sacred  cow's  excreta  a  substitute  for  human  sacrifice 33,  35 

Views  of  Inman  and  Dubois — Ttie  Hebrew  propliets  bedaub  themselves  with  ordure. 

Human  ordure  and  urine  still  used  in  India 35 

Excrement  gods  of  Egy]itians  and  Romans 35,  36 

The  Eoman  goddess  Cloacina. 

Israelitish  dung  gods 36-38 

The  disgusting  worship  of  Baal-Peor — Mexican  gods  of  excrement. 
The  use  of  the  lingam  in  India 38,  39 

Urine  and  ordure  as  signs  of  mourning 39 

Urine  and  ordure  in  industries-- 39-42 

The  Mexican  mode  of  eradicating  dandruff — Urine  in  corporal  ablutions,  and  in  dentifrices. 
Urine  in  ceremonial  lustrations 42-43 

Ordure  in  smoking  and  divination 43 

Ordure  and  urine  employed  as  medicines 44,  45 

Urine  given  to  newly-born  children  in  California  and  Peru — Excrement  used  as  a  cure  for 
wounds  from  poisoned  arrows,  in  Panama;  as  a  cure  for  rattlesnake  bite,  in  Lower  Califor- 
nia; and  as  a  poultice  for  abscesses,  in  Africa — Urine  given  in  domestic  medicine,  in  Europe; 
also,  to  reindeer,  in  Europe  and  Siberia. 

Occult  influences  ascribed  to  ordure  and  urine 46,  47 

Mode  of  administering  urine  among  the  Hurons — Used  by  the  French  and  Komansas  a  cure  for 
fever — English  women  in  labor  drank  their  husbands'  urine — Sprinkled  upon  sick  children  in 
Ireland — Hottentot  priests  sprinkle  urine  upon  the  newly-married,  upon  the  dead,  and  upon 
young  warriors. 

Fearful  rites  of  the  Hottentots 47 

The  Galli  of  Cybele  resembled  the  semi-castrated  Hottentots. 
Urine  used  to  baffle  witches 47,  49 

B3'  Komans,  French,  English,  Scotch,  Irish,  &c. — Boman  matrons  sprinkled  their  urine  upon  the 
the  statue  of  the  goddess  Berecinthia — The  Hurons  of  Canada  wallowed  in  ordure,  according 
to  Father  Le  Jeune  ;  so  did  the  Abyssinians — The  ceremony  of  urination  through  the  wed- 
ding-ring. 

Ordure  used  in  love-philters 49-51 

In  France,  and  by  Apache  and  Nava.io  witches — The  Manichean  mode  of  making  the  eucharislic 
bread — The  Albigenses  used  the  same  method.  ■ 

Burlesque  survivals 51-53 

The  festival  of  Hull — Said  to  be  the  same  as  our  April  Fool's  Day — "Yellow  water"  sprinkled 
upon  people  in  streets — A  custom  much  like  this  noted  in  Portugal — The  Apache  and  Navajo 
feast  of  the  Josh-kan — The  Aztec  festival  of  blind-man's-buff^The  Pawnees  made  a  Sioux 
calumet-bearer  drink  human  urine  as  an  insult — The  term  "excrement-eater  "  one  of  vile 
opprobrium  among  Mandans,  according  to  Matthews — "Water  of  amber"  and  "water  of 
dung." 

Phallic  survivals  in  France 53,  54 

The  use  of  "priapic  wine"  "holy  vinegar,"  &c.,  from  the  sacred  phalli  of  Saint  Foutin  and 
Guerlichon. 

Medicinal  effects  of  urine 54,  55 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 


The  object  of  the  present  monograph  is  to  arrange  in  a  form  for  easy- 
reference  such  allusions  as  have  come  under  the  author's  notice  bearing 
upon  the  use  of  human  ordure,  or  urine,  or  articles  apparently  intended 
as  substitutes  for  them,  whether  in  rites  of  a  clearly  religious  or  ''  medi- 
cine" type  or  in  those  which,  while  not  pronouncedly  such,  have  about 
them  suggestions  that  they  may  be  survivals  of  a  former  existence  of 
urine  dances  or  ur-orgies  among  tribes  and  peoples  from  whose  later 
mode  of  life  and  thought  they  have  been  eliminated. 

The  difficulties  surrounding  the  elucidation  of  this  topic  will,  no  doubt, 
occur  at  once  to  every  student  of  anthropology  or  ethnology.  The  rites 
and  practices  herein  spoken  of  are  to  be  found  only  in  communities  iso- 
lated from  the  world,  and  are  such  as  even  savages  would  shrink  from 
revealing  unnecessarily  to  strangers;  while,  too  frequently,  observers  of 
intelligence  have  failed  to  improve  opportunities  for  noting  the  existence 
of  rites  of  this  nature,  or  else,  restrained  by  a  false  modesty,  have  clothed 
their  remarks  in  vague  and  indefinite  phraseology,  forgetting  that  as  a 
physician,  to  be  skillful,  must  study  his  patients  both  in  sickness  and  in 
health,  so  the  anthropologist  must  study  man,  not  alone  wherein  he  re- 
flects the  grandeur  of  his  Maker,  but  likewise  in  his  grosser  and  more 
animal  propensities. 

Repugnant,  therefore,  as  the  subject  is  under  most  points  of  view,  the 
author  has  felt  constrained  to  reproduce  all  that  he  has  seen  and  read, 
hoping  that  in  the  fuller  consideration  which  all  forms  of  primitive  re- 
ligion are  now  receiving  this,  the  most  brutal,  possibly,  of  them  all,  may 
claim  some  share  of  examination  and  discussion. 

To  serve  as  a  nucleus  for  notes  and  memoranda  since  gleaned,  the 
author  has  reproduced  his  original-  monograph,  first  published  in  the 
Transactions  of  the  American  Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Sci- 
ence, 1885,  and  read  by  title  at  the  Ann  Arbor,  Michigan,  meeting,  in 
the  same  year. 


8  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

The  Urine  Dance  of  the  Zunis. 
On  the  evening  of  November  17,  1881,  during  my  stay  in  the  village  of  Zuni,  New 
Mexico,  the  Nehue-Cue,  one  of  the  secret  orders  of  the  Zunis,  sent  word  to  Mr.  Frank 
H.  Gushing*  (whose  guest  I  was)  that  they  would  do  us  the  unusual  honor  of  coming  to 
our  house  to  give  us  one  of  their  characteristic  dances,  which.  Gushing  said,  was  unpre- 
cedented. 

The  squaws  of  the  governor's  family  put  the  long  "living  room"  to  rights,  sweeping 
the  floor  and  sprinkling  it  with  water  to  lay  the  dust.  Soon  afler  dark  the  dancers 
entered  ;  they  were  twelve  in  number,  two  being  boys.  The  center  men  were  naked  with 
the  exception  of  black  breech-clouts  of  archaic  style.  The  hair  was  worn  naturally,  with 
a  bunch  of  wild  turkey  feathers  tied  in  front  and  one  of  corn-husks  over  each  ear.  White 
l^ands  were  painted  across  the  face  at  eyes  and  mouth.  Each  wore  a  collar  or  neckcloth 
of  black  woolen  stuff.  Broad  white  bands,  one  inch  wide,  were  painted  around  the  body 
at  the  navel,  around  the  arms,  the  legs  at  mid  thighs  and  knees.  Tortoise-shell  rattles 
hung  from  the  right  knee.  Blue  woolen  footless  leggins  were  worn  with  low-cut  mocca- 
sins, and  in  the  right  hand  each  waved  a  wand  made  of  an  ear  of  corn,  trimmed  with  the 
plumage  of  the  wild  turkey  and  macaw.  The  others  were  arrayed  in  old  cast-off  Ameri- 
can Army  clothing,  and  all  wore  white  cotton  night-caps,  with  corn-husks  twisted  into  the 
hair  at  top  of  head  and  ears.  Several  wore,  in  addition  to  the  tortoise-shell  rattles,  strings 
of  brass  sleigh-bells  at  knees.  One  was  more  grotesquely  attired  than  the  rest  in  a  long 
India-rubber  gossamer  "  overall "  and  a  pair  of  goggles,  painted  white,  over  his  eyes.  His 
general  "get-up"  was  a  spirited  take-off  upon  a  Mexican  priest.  Another  was  a  very 
good  counterfeit  of  a  young  woman. 

To  the  accompaniment  of  an  oblong  drum  and  of  the  rattles  and  bells  spoken  of  they 
shuffled  into  the  long  room,  crammed  with  spectators  of  both  sexes  and  of  all  sizes  and 
ages.  Their  song  was  apparently  a  ludicrous  reference  to  everything  and  everybody  in 
sight.  Gushing,  Mindeleff",  and  myself  receiving  special  attention,  to  the  uncontrolled 
merriment  of  the  red-skinned  listeners.  I  had  taken  my  station  at  one  side  of  the  room, 
seated  upon  the  banquette,  and  having  in  front  of  me  a  rude  bench  or  table,  upon  which 
was  a  small  coal-oil  lamp.  I  suppose  that  in  the  halo  diffused  by  the  feeble  light  and  in 
my  "stained-glass  attitude"  I  must  have  borne  some  resemblance  to  the  pictures  of  saints 
hanging  upon  the  walls  of  old  Mexican  churches  ;  to  such  a  flincied  resemblance  I  at  least 
attribute  the  performance  which  followed. 

The  dancers  suddenly  wheeled  into  line,  threw  themselves  on  their  knees  before  my 
table,  and  with  extravagant  beatings  of  breast  began  an  outlandish  but  faithful  mockery  of 
a  Mexican  Catholic  congregation  at  vespers.  One  bawled  out  a  parody  upon  the  Pater- 
noster, another  mumbled  along  in  the  manner  of  an  old  man  reciting  the  rosary,  while 
the  fellow  with  the  India-rubber  coat  jumped  up  and  began  a  passionate  exhortation  or 
sermon,  which  for  mimetic  fidelity  was  incomparable.  This  kept  the  audience  laughing 
with  sore  sides  for  some  moments,  until  at  a  signal  from  the  leader  the  dancers  suddenly 
countermarched  out  of  the  room,  in  single  file,  as  they  had  entered. 

An  interlude  followed  of  ten  minutes,  during  which  the  dusty  floor  was  sprinkled  by 
men  who  spat  water  forcibly  from  their  mouths.  The  Nehue-Cue  re-entered  ;  this  time 
two  of  their  number  were  stark  naked.  Their  singing  was  very  peculiar  and  sounded 
like  a  chorus  of  chimney-sweeps,  and  their  dance  became  a  stiff-legged  jump,  with  heels 
kept  twelve  inches  apart.  After  they  had  ambled  around  the  room  two  or  three  times, 
Gushing  announced  in  the  Zuni  language  that  a  "feast"  was  ready  for  them,  at  which 


*  Mr   Cushing's  reputation  as  an  ethnologist  is  now  so  firmly  established  in  two  continents  tUat 
no  reference  to  his  self-sacrificing  and  invaluable  labors  in  the  canse  of  science  seems  to  be  neces- 


sary. 


URIKE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  9 

they  loudly  roared  their  approbation  and  advanced  to  strike  hands  with  the  munificent 
"Americanos,"  addressing  us  in  a  funny  gibberish  of  broken  Spanish,  English,  and  Zuni. 
They  then  squatted  upon  the  ground  and  consumed  with  zest  large  "oUas"  full  of  tea, 
and  dishes  of  hard  tack  and  sugar.  As  they  were  about  finishing  this  a  squaw  entered, 
carrying  an  "olla"  of  urine,  of  which  the  filthy  brutes  drank  heartily. 

I  refused  to  believe  the  evidence  of  my  senses,  and  asked  Gushing  if  that  were  really 
human  urine.  "Why,  certainly,"  replied  he,  "and  here  comes  more  of  it."  This  time, 
it  was  a  large  tin  pailful,  not  less  than  two  gallons.  I  was  standing  by  the  squaw  as  she 
offered  this  strange  and  abominable  refreshment.  She  made  a  motion  with  her  hand  to 
indicate  to  me  that  it  was  urine,  and  one  of  the  old  men  repeated  the  Spanish  word  mear 
(to  urinate),  while  ray  sense  of  smell  demonstrated  the  truth  of  their  statements. 

The  dancers  swallowed  great  draughts,  smacked  their  lips,  and,  amid  the  roaring  mer- 
riment of  the  spectators,  remai'ked  that  it  was  very,  very  good.  The  clowns  were  now 
upon  their  mettle,  each  trying  to  surpass  his  neighbors  in  feats  of  nastiness.  One  swal- 
lowed a  fragment  of  corn-husk,  saying  he  thought  it  very  good  and  better  than  bread  ; 
his  vis-d-vis  attempted  to  chew  and  gulp  down  a  piece  of  filthy  rag.  Another  expressed 
regret  that  the  dance  had  not  been  held  out  of  doors,  in  one  of  the  plazas  ;  there  they 
could  show  what  they  could  do.  There  they  always  made  it  a  point  of  honor  to  eat  the 
excrement  of  men  and  dogs. 

For  my  own  part  I  felt  satisfied  with  the  omission,  particularly  as  the  room,  stuffed 
with  one  hundred  Zunis,  had  become  so  foul  and  filthy  as  to  be  almost  unbearable.  The 
dance,  as  good  luck  would  have  it,  did  not  last  many  minutes,  and  we  soon  had  a  chance 
to  run  into  the  refreshing  night  air. 

To  this  outline  description  of  a  disgusting  rite  I  have  little  to  add.  The  Zunis,  in 
explanation,  stated  that  the  Nehue-Oue  were  a  Medicine  Order  which  held  these  dances 
from  time  to  time  to  inure  the  stomachs  of  members  to  any  kind  of  food,  no  matter 
how  revolting.  This  statement  may  seem  plausible  enough  when  we  understand  that 
religion  and  medicine  among  primitive  races  are  almost  always  one  and  the  same  thing, 
or,  at  least,  so  closely  intertwined  that  it  is  a  matter  of  difficulty  to  decide  where  one 
begins  and  the  other  ends. 

Religion  in  its  dramatic  ceremonial  preserves,  to  some  extent,  the  history  of  the  par- 
ticular race  in  which  it  dwells.  Among  nations  of  high  development,  miracles,  morali- 
ties, and  passion  plays  have  taught,  down  to  our  own  day,  in  object  lessons,  the  sacred 
history  in  which  the  spectators  believed.  Some  analogous  purjjose  may  have  been  held 
in  \aew  by  the  first  organizers  of  the  urine  dance.  In  their  early  history,  the  Zunis  and 
other  Pueblos  suffered  from  constant  warfare  with  savage  antagonists  and  with  each  other. 
From  the  position  of  their  villages,  long  sieges  must  of  necessity  have  been  sustained,  in 
which  sieges  famine  and  disease,  no  doubt,  were  the  allies  counted  upon  by  the  investing 
forces.  We  may  have  in  this  abominable  dance  a  tradition  of  the  extremity  to  which  the 
Zunis  of  the  long  ago  were  reduced  at  some  unknown  period.  A  similar  catastrophe  in 
the  history  of  the  Jews  is  intimated  in  II  Kings,  xviii,  27  ;  and  again  in  Isaiah,  xxxvi, 
12  :  "But  Eab-shakeh  said  unto  them  :  hath  my  master  sent  me  to  thy  master,  and  to 
thee  to  speak  these  words  ?  hath  he  not  sent  me  to  the  men  which  sit  on  the  wall,  that 
they  may  eat  their  oivn  dung  and  drink  their  oivnpiss  with  you?"  In  the  course  of  my 
studies  I  came  across  a  reference  to  a  very  similar  dance,  occurring  among  one  of  the 
fimatical  sects  of  the  Arabian  Bedouins,  but  the  journal  in  which  it  was  recorded,  the 
London  Lancet,  I  think,  was  unfortunately  mislaid. 

As  illustrative  of  the  tenacity  with  which  such  vile  ceremonial,  once  adopted  by  a  sect, 
will  adhere  to  it  and  become  ingrafted  upon  its  life,  long  after  the  motives  which  have 
suggested  or  commended  it  have  vanished  in  oblivion,  let  me  quote  a  few  lines  from  Max 
Miiller's  "Chips  from  a  German  Workshop,"  "Essay  upon  the  Parsees,"  pp.  163,  164, 


10  URINE  DANCES  AND  UE-ORGIES. 

Scri)_)ner's  editiou,  1869:  "The  riirang  is  the  urine  of  a  cow,  ox,  or  she-goat,  and  the 
rubbing  of  it  over  the  face  and  hands  is  the  second  thing  a  Parsee  does  after  getting  out 
of  bed.  Either  before  applying  the  nirang  to  the  face  and  hands,  or  while  it  remanis 
on  the  hands  after  being  applied,  he  sliould  not  touch  anything  directly  with  his  hands  ; 
but,  in  order  to  wash  out  the  Nirang,  he  either  asks  somebody  else  to  pour  water  on  his 
hands,  or  resorts  to  the  device  of  taking  hold  of  the  pot  through  the  intervention  of  a 
piece  of  cloth,  such  as  a  handkerchief,  or  his  sudra,  i.  e.,  his  blouse.  He  first  pours 
water  on  his  hand,  then  takes  the  pot  in  that  hand  and  washes  his  other  hand,  face,  and 
feet."     (Quoting  from  Dadabhai-Nadrosi' s  Description  of  the  Parsees.) 

Continuing,  Max  Muller  says  :  "Strange  as  this  process  of  purification  may  appear,  it 
becomes  perfectly  disgusting  when  we  are  told  that  women,  after  childbirth,  have  not 
only  to  undergo  this  sacred  ablution,  but  actually  to  drink  a  little  of  the  nirang,  and 
that  the  same  rite  is  imposed  on  children  at  the  time  of  their  investiture  with  the  Sudra 
and  Koshti,  the  badges  of  the  Zoroastrian  faith." 

THE    FEAST    OF    FOOLS    IN    EUROPE. 

Closely  corresponding  to  this  urine  dance  of  the  Zunis  was  the  Feast 
of  Fools,  in  Continental  Europe,  the  description  of  which,  here  given,  is 
quoted  from  Dulaure : 

La  grand'messe  commen(,'ait  alors  ;  tons  les  ecclesiastiques  y  assistaient,  le  visage  bar- 
bouille  de  noir,  ou  convert  d'un  masque  hideux  ou  ridicule.  Pendant  la  celebration,  les 
uns,vttus  en  baladins  ou  en  femmes,  dansaient  au  milieu  du  chojur  et  y  chantaient  des 
chansons  bouflfbnes  ou  obscenes.  Les  autres  venaient  manger  sur  I'autel  des  saucisses  et 
des  boudins,  jouer  aux  cartes  ou  aux  dez,  devant  le  pretre  celebrant,  I'encensaient  avec 
un  encensoir,  ou  brulaient  de  vieilles  savates,  et  lui  en  faisaient  respirer  la  fumee. 

Apres  la  messe,  nouveaux  actes  d' extravagance  et  d' impiety.  Les  pretres,  confondus 
avec  les  habitans  des  deux  sexes,  couraient,  dansaient  dans  I'eglise,  s'excitaient  a  toutes 
les  folies,  a  toutes  les  actions  licencieuses  que  leur  inspirait  une  imagination  effren6e. 
Plus  de  honte,  plus  de  pudeur  :  aucune  digue  n'arretait  le  debordement  de  la  folie"  et  des 

*  *  *  *  * 

passions. 

Au  milieu  du  tumulte,  des  blasphemes  et  des  chants  dissolus,  on  voyait  les  uns  se 
depouiller  entierement  de  leurs  habits,   d'autres  se  livrer  aux  actes  du  plus  honteux 

libertinage.  , 

*  *  *  Les  acteurs,  months  sur  des  tombereaux  pleins  d' ordures,  s  amusaient  a  en 
Jeter  a  la  populace  qui  les  entouraieut.  *  *  *  Ces  scenes  etaient  toujours  accom- 
pagn6es  de  chansons  ordurieres  et  irapies.— (Dulaure,  "Des  Divinites  Generatrices,' 
chap.  XV,  p.  315,  et  seq.,  Paris,  1825.) 

COMPARISON    BETWEEN    THE    FEAST    OF    FOOLS    AND    THE    URINE    DANCE. 

In  the  al)Ove  description  may  be  seen  that  the  principal  actors  (taking 
possession  of  the  church  during  high  mass)  had  their  faces  daubed  and 
painted,  or  masked  in  a  harlequin  manner ;  that  they  were  dressed  as 
clowns  or  as  women ;  that  they  ate  upon  the  altar  itself  sausages  and 
blood-puddings.  Now  the  word  blood-pudding,  in  French,  is  houdin— 
but  houdin  also  meant  excrement^     Add  to  this  the  feature  that  these 

*See  in  Dictionary  of  French  and  EngUsh  Language,  by  Ferdinand  E.  A.Gasc.  London.  Bell  and 

Daldv.  York  street,  Covent  Garden.  1873.  ^v    i.  •     i        , 

Littro,  whose  work  appeared  in  1863,  gives  as  one  of  his  definitions,  "anything  that  is  shaped 

like  a  sausage."  .  >    i  c   •»• 

Bescherelle,  Spiers  and  Surenne  and  Beyer,  do  not  give  Gasc  s  dehnition. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  H 

clowns,  after  leaving  the  church,  took  their  stand  in  dung-carts  {tomber- 
eaux),  and  threw  ordure  upon  the  bystanders ;  and  finally  that  some  of 
these  actors  appeared  perfectly  naked  {"  on  yoyait  les  lins  se  depouiller 
entierement  de  leurs  habits  "),  and  it  must  be  admitted  that  there  is 
certainly  a  wonderful  concatenation  of  resemblances  between  these  filthy 
and  inexplicable  rites  on  different  sides  of  a  great  ocean. 

THE    FEAST   OF    FOOLS   TRACED    BACK    TO    MOST   ANCIENT   TIMES. 

Dulaure  makes  no  attempt  to  trace  the  origin  of  these  ceremonies  in 
France;  he  contents  himself  with  saying,  ''ces  ceremonies  *  *  * 
ont  subsiste  pendant  douze  ou  quinze  si^cles,"  or,  in  other  words,  that 
they  were  of  Pagan  origin.  In  twelve  or  fifteen  hundred  years  the 
rite  might  well  have  been  sublimed  from  the  eating  of  pure  excre- 
ment, as  among  the  Zunis,  to  the  consumption  of  the  "  boudin,"  the 
excrement  symbol.*  Conceding  for  the  moment  that  this  suspicion  is 
correct,  we  have  a  proof  of  the  antiquity  of  the  urine  dance  among  the 
Zunis.  So  great  is  the  resemblance  between  the  Zuni  rite  and  that  just 
described  by  Dulaure,  that  we  should  have  reason  for  believing  that  the 
new  country  borrowed  from  the  old  some  of  the  features  transmitted  to 
the  present  day,  and  were  there  not  evidence  of  a  wider  distribution 
of  this  observance,  it  might  be  assumed  that  the  Catholic  missionaries 
(who  worked  among  the  Zunis  from  1580,  or  thereabout,  and  excepting 
during  intervals  of  revolt  remained  on  duty  in  Zuni  down  to  the  period 
of  American  occupation)  found  the  obscene  and  disgusting  orgie  in  full 
vigor,  and  realizing  the  danger,  by  unwise  precipitancy,  of  destroying 
all  hopes  of  winning  over  this  people,  shrewdly  concluded  to  tacitly  accept 
the  religious  abnormality  and  to  engraft  upon  it  the  plant  flourishing 
so  bravely  in  the  vicinity  of  their  European  homes. 

DISAPPEARANCE    OF    THE    FEAST    OF    FOOLS. 

In  France,  the  Feast  of  Fools  disappeared  only  with  the  French  Revo- 
lution; in  other  parts  of  Continental  Europe  it  began  to  wane  about  the 
time  of  the  Reformation.  In  England,  "  the  abbot  of  unreason,"  whose 
pranks  are  outlined  by  Sir  Walter  Scott,  in  his  novel,  "  The  Abbot,"  the 
miracle  plays  which  had  once  served  a  good  purpose  in  teaching  script- 
tural  lessons  to  an  illiterate  peasantry,  and  the  "  moralities  "  of  same 
general  purport,  faded  away  under  the  stern  antagonism  of  the  Puritan 

*  And  very  probably  a  phallic  symbol  also. 


12  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

iconoclast.  The  Feast  of  Fools,  as  such,  was  abohshed  by  Henry  VIII 
A.  D.  1541.  (See  "  The  English  Keformation,"  Francis  Charles  Mas- 
singberd,  London,  1857,  p.  125.*)  Picart's  account  of  the  Feast  of 
Fools  is  similar  to  that  given  by  Dulaure.  He  says  that  it  took  place 
in  the  church,  at  Christmas  tide,  and  was  borrowed  from  the  Koman 
Saturnalia;  was  never  approved  of  by  the  Christian  church,  as  a  body, 
Ijut  fought  against  from  the  earliest  times : 

Les  uns  etoient  masques  ou  avec  des  visages  barbouilles  qui  faisoient  peur  ou  qui  faisoient 
rire  ;  les  autres  en  habits  de  femmes  ou  de  pantomimes,  tels  que  sont  les  ministres  du 
theatre. 

lis  dansoient  dans  le  choeur,  en  entrant,  et  chantoient,  des  chansons  obscenes.  Les 
Diacres  et  les  sou-diacres  prenoient  plaisir  a  mager  des  boudins  et  des  saucisses  sur  I'autel, 
au  nez  du  pretre  celebrant ;  ils  jouoient  a  des  seux  aux  cartes  et  aux  des  ;  ils  mettoient  dans 
I'encensoir  quelques  morceaux  de  vieilles  savates  pour  lui  faire  respirer  une  mauvaise 
odeur. 

Apres  la  messe,  chacun  couroit,  sautoit  et  dansoit  par  Teglise  avec  tant  d'impudence, 
que  quelques  uns  n'avoient  pas  honte  de  se  porter  a  toutes  sortes  d'indecences  et  de  se 
depouiller  entierement ;  ensuite,  ils  se  faisoient  trainer  par  les  rues  dans  des  tombereaux 
pleins  d' ordures,  d'ou  ils  prenoient  plaisir  d'en  jeter  a  la  populace  qui  s'assembloit  autour 
d'eux. 

lis  s'arretoient  et  faisoient  de  leurs  corps  des  mouvements  et  des  postures  lascives  qu'ils 
accompagnoient  de  paroles  impudiques. 

Les  plus  impudiques  d'entre  les  seculiers  se  meloient  parmi  le  clerge,  pour  faire  aussi 
quelques  personnages  de  Foux  en  habits  ecclesiastiques  de  Moines  et  de  Religieuses. — 
(Picart,  "Coutumes  et  Ceremonies  religieuses  de  toutes  les  Nations  du  Monde,''  Am- 
sterdam, Holland,  1729,  vol.  ix,  pp.  5,  6.) 

Diderot  and  d'Alembert  use  almost  the  same  terms ;  the  officiating 
clergy  were  clad  "les  uns  comme  des  bouflFons,  les  autres  en  habits  de 
femmes  ou  masques  d'une  fagon  monstrueuse  *  *  *  ils  mangeaient  et 
jonaient  aux  d6s  sur  I'autel  ^  c6te  du  pretre  qui  celebroit  la  messe.  lis 
mettoient  des  ordures  dans  les  encensoirs."  They  say  that  the  details 
would  not  bear  repetition.  This  feast  prevailed  generally  in  Continental 
Europe  from  Christmas  to  Epiphany,  and  in  England,  especially  in 
York.  (Diderot  and  d'Alembert,  Encyclopsedia,  "  Fete  des  Fous,"  Ge- 
neva, Switzerland,  1779.) 

THE   COMMEMORATIVE   CHARACTER   OF   RELIGIOUS    FESTIVALS. 

The  opinion  expressed  above  concerning  the  commemorative  character 
of  religious  festivals  echoes  that  which  Godfrey  Higgins  enunciated  sev- 


*Faber  advances  the  opinion  that  the  "  mummers  "  or  clowns  who  figured  in  the  pastimes  of  the 
abbot  of  unreason,  &c.,  bear  a  strong  resemblance  to  the  animal-headed  Egyptian  priests  in  the 
sacred  dances  represented  on  the  Bembine  or  Isiac  table.  (See  Faber's  "Pagan  Idolatry,"  Lon- 
don, 181C,  vol.  2,  p.  479.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  13 

ral  generations  ago.  The  learned  author  of  Anacalypsis  says  that  fes- 
ivals,  "  accompanied  with  dancing  and  music,  *  *  were  establislied  to 
:eep  in  recollection  victories  or  other  important  events."  (Higgins' 
Vnacalypsis,  London,  1810,  vol.  2,  p.  424.)  He  argues  the  subject  at 
ome  length  on  pages  424-426,  but  the  above  is  sufficient  for  the  present 
)urpose. 

In  the  religious  rites  of  a  people  I  should  expect  to  find  the  earliest  of  their  habits  and 
ustoms. — (Higgins'  Anacalypsis,  vol.  1,  p.  15.) 

Applying  the  above  remark  to  the  Zuni  dance,  it  may  be  interpreted 
IS  a  dramatic  pictograph  of  some  half-forgotten  episode  in  tribal  history, 
Co  strengthen  this  view  by  example,  let  us  recall  the  fact  that  the  Army 
)f  Crusaders  under  Peter  the  Hermit*  was  so  closely  beleagured  by  the 
VIoslems  in  Nicomedia  in  Bithynia  that  they  were  compelled'  to  drink 
iheir  own  urine.f  We  read  the  narrati^ie  set  out  in  cold  type.  The 
Ziunis  would  have  transmitted  a  record  of  the  event  by  a  dramatic  rep- 
:^esentation  which  time  would  incrust  with  all  the  veneration  that  religion 
30uld  impart. 

Dancing  was  originally  merely  religious,  intended  to  assist  the  memory  in  retaining  the 
sacred  learning  which  originated  previous  to  the  invention  of  letters. 

Indeed,  I  believe  that  there  were  no  part  of  the  rites  and  ceremonies  of  antiquity  which 
ivere  not  adopted  with  a  view  to  keep  in  recollection  the  ancient  learning  before  letters 
ivere  known. — (Higgins'  Anacalypsis,  vol.  2.  p.  179.) 

FEAY    DIEGO    DURAN's   ACCOUNT   OF    THE    MEXICAN    FESTIVALS. 

All  that  Higgins  believed  was  believed  and  asserted  by  the  Dominican 
missionary  Diego  Duran.  Duran  complains  bitterly  that  the  unwise  de- 
struction of  the  ancient  Mexican  pictographs  and  all  that  explained  the 
religion  of  the  natives  left  the  missionaries  in  ignorance  as  to  what  was 
religion  and  what  was  not.  The  Indians,  taking  advantage  of  this,  mocked 
and  ridiculed  the  dogmas  and  ceremonies  of  the  new  creed  in  the  very  face 
of  its  expounders,  who  still  lacked  a  complete  mastery  of  the  language 
of  the  conquered.  The  Indians  never  could  be  induced  to  admit  that 
they  still  adhered  to  their  old  superstitions,  or  that  they  were  boldly 
indulging  in  their  religious  observances ;  many  times,  says  the  shrewd 
old  chronicler,  it  would  appear  that  they  were  merely  indulging  in  some 
pleasant  pastime,  while  they  were  really  engaged  in  idolatry ;  or  that 

*  Purchas,  Pilgrims,  lib.  8,  chap.  1,  p.  1191.  London,  1622.  Neither  Gibbon  norMichaud  expresses 
this  fact  so  clearly,  but  each  speaks  of  the  terrible  sufferings  which  decimated  the  undisciplined 
hordes  of  Peter  and  Walter  the  Penniless,  and  reduced  the  surv.'vors  to  cannibalism. 

t  In  one  of  the  sieges  of  Samaria  it  is  recorded  that  "  the  fourth  part  of  a  cab  of  dove's  dung  sold 
for  five  pieces  of  silver."    (2  Kings,  vi :  25.) 


l^  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

they  were  playing  games,  when  truly  they  were  casting  lots  for  future 
events  before  the  priest's  eyes ;  or  that  they  were  subjecting  themselves 
to  penitential  discipline,  when  they  were  sacrificing  to  their  gods.  This 
remark  applied  to  all  that  they  did.  In  dances,  in  baths,  in  markets, 
in  singing  their  songs,  in  their  dramas  (the  word  is  "  comedia,"  a  comedy, 
but  a  note  in  the  margin  of  the  manuscript  says  that  probably  this  ought 
to  be  "  comida,"  food,  or  dinner,  or  feast),  in  sowing,  in  reaping,  in  putting 
away  the  harvest  in  their  granaries,  even  in  tilhng  the  ground,  in  build- 
ing their  houses,  in  their  funerals,  in  their  burials,  in  marriages,  in  the 
birth  of  children,  into  everything  they  did  entered  idolatry  and  super- 
stition. 

Parece  muchas  veces  pensar  que  estan  liaciendo  placer  y  estan  idolatrando  ;  y  pensar 
que  estan  jugando  y  estan  echando  suertes  de  los  sucesos  delante  de  nuestros  ojos  y  no  los 
entendemos  y  pensamos  que  se  disciplinan  y  estanse  sacrificando. 

Y  asi  erraron  mucho  los  que  con  bueno  celo  (pero  no  con  mucha  prudencia),  quema- 
ron  y  destruyeron  al  principio  todas  las  pinturas  de  antiguallas  que  tenian  ;  pues,  nos 
dejaron  tan  sin  luz  que  delante  de  nuestros  ojos  idolatran  y  no  los  entendemos. 

En  los  mitotes,  en  los  banos,  en  los  mercados,  y  en  los  cantares  que  cantan  lamen- 
tando  sus  Dioses  y  sus  Senores  Antiguos,  en  las  comedias,  en  los  banquetes,  y  en  el  diferen- 
ciar  en  el  de  ellas,  en  todo  se  halla  supersticion  e  idolatria ;  en  el  senibrar,  en  el  coger, 
en  el  encerrar  en  los  troges,  hasta  en  el  labrar  la  tierra  y  edificar  las  casas  ;  pues  en  los  mort- 
uorios  y  entierros,  y  en  los  casamientos  y  en  los  nacimientos  de  los  nifios,  especial mente 
si  era  hijo  de  algun  Senor,  eran  estranas  las  ceremonias  que  se  le  hacian  ;  y  donde  todo 
se  perfeccionaba  era  en  la  celebracion  de  las  fiestas  ;  finalmente,  en  todo  mezclaban  super- 
sticion 6  idolatria  ;  hasta  en  irse  a  banarse  al  rio  los  viejos,  puesto  escn'ipulo  a  la  repub- 
lica  sino  fuese  hablendo  precedido  tales  y  tales  ceremonias  ;  todo  lo  cual  nos  es  encubierto 
por  el  gran  secreto  que  tienen.— (Diego  Duran,  lib.  2,  concluding  remarks.) 

Fray  Diego  Duran,  a  Fray  Predicador  of  the  Dominican  Order,  says, 
at  the  end  of  his  second  volume,  that  it  was  finished  in  1581.   • 

The  very  same  views  were  held  by  Father  Geronimo  Boscana,  a  Fran- 
ciscan, who  ministered  for  seventeen  years  to  the  Indians  of  CaUfornia. 
Every  act  of  an  Indian's  life  was  guided  by  religion.  (See  "Chinigchinich," 
included  in  A.  A.  Robinson's  "California,"  New  York,  1850.) 

The  Apaches  have  dances  in  which  the  prehistoric  condition  of  the  tribe 
is  thus  represented;  so  have  the  Mojaves  and  the  Zunis;  while  in  the 
snake  dance  of  the  Moc^uis  and  the  sun  dance  of  the  Sioux  the  same 
faithful  adherence  to  traditional  costume  and  manners  is  apparent. 

THE   UEINE    DANCE  OF   THE    ZUNIS    MAY    CONSERVE  A  TRADITION  OF  THE 
TIME   WHEN    VILE   ALIMENT   WAS   IN   USE. 

The  Zuni  urine  dance  may  therefore  not  improperly  be  considered, 
among  other  points  of  view,  under  that  which  suggests  a  commemora- 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  15 

tion  of  the  earliest  life  of  this  people,  when  vile  aliment  of  every  kind 
may  have  been  in  use  through  necessity. 

An  examination  of  evidence  will  show  that  foods  now  justly  regarded 
as  noxious  weee  once  not  unknown  to  nations  of  even  greater  develop- 
ment than  any  as  yet  attained  by  the  Rio  Grande  Pueblos.  Necessity 
was  not  always  the  inciting  motive ;  frequently  religious  frenzy  was 
responsible  for  orgies  of  which  only  vague  accounts  and  still  vaguer  ex- 
planations have  come  down  to  us. 

EXCREMENT   USED    IN    HUMAN    FOOD. 

The  very  earliest  accounts  of  the  Indians  of  Florida  and  Texas  refer 
to  the  use  of  such  aliment.  Cabega  de  Vaca,  one  of  the  survivors  of  the 
ill-fated  expedition  of  Panfilo  de  Narvaez,  was  a  prisoner  among  various 
tribes  for  many  years,  and  finally,  accompanied  by  three  comrades  as 
wretched  as  himself,  succeeded  in  traversing  the  continent,  coming  out 
at  Ouliacan,  on  the  Pacific  coast,  in  1536. 

His  narrative  says  that  the  "Floridians  "  for  food  dug  roots,  and  that 
they  ate  spiders,  ant's  eggs,  worms,  lizards,  salamanders,  snakes,  earth, 
wood,  ^he  dung  of  deer,  and  many  other  things."*  The  same  account, 
given  in  Purchas'  Pilgrims  (vol.  4,  lib.  8,  cap.  1,  sec.  2,  p.  1512),  ex- 
presses it  that  "they  also  eat  earth,  wood,  and  whatever  they  can  get; 
the  dung  of  wild  beasts."  These  remarks  may  be  understood  as  apply- 
ing to  all  tribes  seen  by  this  early  explorer  east  of  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains. 

Gomara  identifies  this  loathsome  diet  with  a  particular  tribe,  the 
"  Yaguaces  "  of  Florida.  "  They  eat  spiders,  ants,  worms,  lizards  of  two 
kinds,  snakes,  wood,  earth,  and  ordure  of  all  kinds  of  wild  animals."t 

The  California  Indians  were  still  viler.  The  German  Jesuit,  Father 
Jacob  Baegert,  speaking  of  the  Lower  Californians  (among  whom  he 
resided  continuously  from  1748  to  1765),  says : 

They  eat  the  seeds  of  the  pitahaya  [giant  cactus]  which  have  passed  off  undigested 
from  their  own  stomachs  ;  they  gather  their  own  excrement,  separate  the  seeds  from 
it,  roast,  grind,  and  eat  them,  making  merry  over  the  loathsome  meal. 

*Ils  mangent  des  araignees,  des  oeufs  de  fourniis,  des  vers,  deslfizards,  des  salamandres,  des  cou- 
leuvres,  de  la  terre,  du  bois,  de  la  fiente  de  cerfs  et  bien  d'autres  ehoses. — (Alvar  Nunez  Cabe^a  de 
Vaca,  in  Ternaux,  vol  7,  p.  144.) 

tComen  aranas,  hormigas,  gusanos,  salamanquesas,  lagartijas,  culebras,  palos,  tierra  y  eaga- 
jones  y  cagurratas.  (G6mara  "Historia  de  las  Indias,"  p.  182.)  He  derives  his  information  from 
the  narrative  of  Vaca.  The  word  "cagajon"  means  horse  dung,  the  dung  of  mules  and  asses; 
"cagarruta"  the  dung  of  sheep,  goats,  and  mice. 


IQ  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

And  again : 

In  the  mission  of  St.  Ignatius  *  *•  *  there  are  persons  who  will  attach  a  \)iecQ  of 
meat  to  a  string  and  swallow  it  and  pull  it  out  again  a  dozein  times  iu  succession  for  the 
sake  of  protracting  the  enjoyment  of  its  taste. — (Translation  of  Dr.  Charles  F.  Rau,  iu 
Annual  Report  Smithsonian  Institution,  1866,  p.  363.) 

A  similar  use  of  meat  tied  to  a  string  is  understood  to  have  once 
been  practiced  by  European  sailors  for  the  purpose  of  teasing  green  com- 
rades suffering  from  the  agonies  of  sea-sickness. 

Castafieda  alludes  to  the  Californians  as  a  race  of  naked  savages  who 
ate  their  own  excrement.* 

The  same  information  is  to  found  in  Clavigero  ("Historia  de  la  Baja 
California,"  Mexico,  1852,  p.  24),  and  in  H.  H.  Bancroft's  "  Native  Races 
of  the  Pacific  Slope,"  vol.  1,  p.  561,  both  of  whom  derive  from  Father 
Baegert.  Orozco  y  Berra  also  has  the  story,  but  he  adds  that  oftentimes 
numbers  of  the  Californians  would  meet  and  pass  the  delicious  titljit  from 
mouth  to  mouth.f 

The  Indians  of  British  North  America,  according  to  Harmon,  "  boil  the 
buffalo  paunch,  with  much  of  its  dung  adhering  to  it " — a  filthy  mode 
of  cooking,  which  in  itself  would  mean  little  since  it  can  be  paralleled  in 
almost  all  tribes;  but,  in  another  paragraph,  the  same  author  says, 
"  many  consider  a  broth  made  by  means  of  the  dung  of  the  cariboo  and 
the  hare  to  be  a  dainty  dish."     (Harmon's  Journal,  &c.,  Andover,  1820, 

p.  324.t) 

The  x\bbe  Domenech  asserts  the  same  of  the  bands  near  Lake  Superior : 

In  boiling  their  wild  rice  to  eat  they  mix  it  with  the  excrement  of  rabbit — a  delicacy 
appreciated  by  the  epicures  among  them. — (Domenech,  "Deserts,"  vol.  2,  p.  311.) 

Of  the  negroes  of  Guinea,  an  old  authority  relates  that  they  ''  ate 
filthy,  stinking  elephant's  and  buffalo's  flesh,  wherein  there  is  a  thousand 
inaggots,  and  many  times  stinks  like  carrion.      *      *      *      They  eat 


*Peuple  de  sauvages  qui  vont  tous  nus  et  qui  uiangcnt  leurs  propres  ordures.— (Castafieda, 
Ternaux,  vol.  9,  p.  156.) 

Castaneda  de  Nagera  accompanied  the  expedition  of  Francisco  Vasquez  tie  Coronado  which 
entered  Arizona,  New  Mexico,  and  the  bufifalo  country  in  1540-'4:2.  Part  of  this  expedition,  under 
Don  Garcia  Lope  de  Cardena,  went  down  the  Colorado  River,  which  separates  California  from 
Arizona,  while  another  detachment,  under  Melchior  Diaz,  struck  the  river  closer  to  its  mouth 
and  crossed  into  California. 

t  Algumas  veces  se  juntan  varios  Indios  y  d  la  redonda  va  corriendo  el  bocado  de  uno  en  otro.— 
(Orozco  y  Berra,  "  Geografia  delas  lenguas  de  Mejico,"  Mexico,  1854,  p.  350.) 

J  Harmon's  notes  are  of  special  interest  at  this  point,  because  he  is  speaking  of  the  Ta-cully  or 
Carriers,  who  belong  to  the  same  Tinneh  stock  as  the  Apaches  and  Navajoes  of  Arizona  and  New 
Mexico,  Lipans  of  Texas,  Umpquas  of  Washington  Territory,  Hoopahs  of  California,  and  Slow- 
cuss  of  the  head-waters  of  the  Columbia  River. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UE- ORGIES.  l^ 

raw  dogge  guts,  and  never  seethe  nor  roast  them."*  And  another  says 
that  the  Mossagueyes  make  themselves  "a  pottage  with  milk  and  fresh 
dung  of  kine,  which,  mixed  together  and  heat  at  the  fire,  they  drinke 
saying  it  makes  them  strong."  (Purchas,  hb.  9,  cap.  12,  sec.  4,  p.  1555.) 
The  Peruvians  ate  their  meat  and  fish  raw,  but  nothing  further  is  said 
by  Gomara.f 

HUMAN    ORDURE    EATEN    BY    EAST    INDIAN    FANATICS. 

Speaking  of  the  remnants  of  the  Hindu  sect  of  the  Aghozis,  an  Eng- 
lish writer  observes : 

In  proof  of  their  indifFereuce  to  worldly  objects,  they  eat  and  drink  whatever  is  given 
them,  even  ordwe  and  carrion.  They  smear  their  bodies  also  with  excrement,  and  carry 
it  about  with  them  in  a  wooden  cup,  or  skull,  either  to  swallow  it,  if  by  so  doing  they  can  get 
a  few  pice,  or  to  throw  it  upon  the  persons  or  into  the  houses  of  those  who  refuse  to  com^ 
ply  with  their  demands. — ("  Religious  Sects  of  the  Hindus,"  in  Asiatic  Researches,  vol. 
17,  p.  205,  Calcutta,  India,  1832.) 

Another  writer  confirms  the  above.  The  Abb6  Dubois  says  that  the 
Gurus  or  Indian  priests  sometimes,  as  a  mark  of  favor,  present  to  their 
disciples  "  the  water  in  which  they  had  washed  their  feet,  which  is  pre- 
served and  sometimes  drunk  by  those  who  receive  it."  (Dubois,  "People 
of  India,"  London,  1817,  p.  64.)  This  practice,  he  tells  us,  is  general 
among  the  sectaries  of  Siva,  and  is  not  uncommon  with  many  of  the  Vish- 
nuites  in  regard  to  their  vashtuma.  "  Neither  is  it  the  most  disgusting 
of  the  practices  that  prevail  in  that  sect  of  fanatics,  as  they  are  under  the 
reproach  of  eating,  as  a  hallowed  morsel,  the  very  ordure  that  proceeds 
from  their  Gurus,  and  swallowing  the  water  with  which  they  have  rinsed 
their  mouths  or  washed  their  faces,  with  many  other  practices  equally 
revolting  to  nature."     {Idem,  p.  71. |) 

That  the  same  disgusting  veneration  was  accorded  the  person  of  the 

Grand  Lama,  of  Thibet,  was  once  generally  believed.     Maltebrun  asserts 

it  in  positive  terms : 

It  is  a  certain  fact  that  the  refuse  excreted  from  his  body  is  collected  with  sacred  solici- 
tude, to  be  employed  as  amulets  and  infallible  antidotes  to  disease. 

*De  Bry,  Ind.  Orient,  in  Purchas'  Pilgrims,  vol.  2,  p.  935. 

tComen  cruclo  la  came,  y  el  pescado.— (Grdmara,  Hist,  de  las  Indias,  p.  234.^ 

t  Again,  on  p.  .'«1,  Dubois  alludes  to  the  "  Gynmosophists,  or  naked  Samyasis  of  India,  *  *  * 
eating  human  excrement,  without  showing  the  slightest  symptom  of  disgust." 

As  bearing  not  unremotely  upon  this  point,  the  author  wishes  to  say,  that  in  his  personal  notes 
and  memoranda  can  be  found  references  to  one  of  the  medicine-men  of  the  Sioux,  who  assured  his 
admirers  that  everything  about  him  was  "medicine,"  even  his  excrement,  which  could  be  trans- 
muted into  copper  cartridges. 


18  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR  ORGIES. 

And,  quoting  from  Pallas,  book  1,  p.  212,  he  adds: 

H  est  hors  de  doute  que  le  contenu  de  sa  chaise  perc6e  est  d6voteraent  recueilli ;  les 
parties  solides  sont  distribuees  comme  des  amulettes  qu'on  porte  au  cou  ;  le  liquide  est 
pris  int^rieuremeut  comme  ime  med6cine  infallible. — (Maltebrun,  Universal  Geography, 
article  "Thibet,"  vol.  2,  lib.  45,  American  edition,  Philadelphia,  1832.) 

The  Abbe  Hue  denies  this  assertion  : 

The  Tale  Lama  is  venerated  by  the  Thibetans  and  the  Mongols  like  a  divinity.  The 
influence  he  exercises  over  the  Buddhist  population  is  truly  astonishing  ;  but  still  it  is 
going  too  far  to  say  that  his  excrements  are  carefully  collected  and  made  into  amulets, 
which  devotees  inclose  in  pouches  and  carry  around  their  necks.  —  (Hue,  Travels  in 
Tartary,  Thibet,  and  China,  London,  1849,  vol.  2,  p.  198.) 

HUC   AND    DUBOIS   COMPARED. 

Hue  was  a  keen  and  observing  traveler ;  he  was  well  acquainted  with 
the  languages  and  eustoms  of  the  Mongolians ;  his  tour  into  Thibet  was 
replete  with  incident,  and  his  narrative  never  flags  in  interest.  Still,  in 
Thibet,  he  was  only  a  traveler ;  the  upper  classes  of  the  Buddhist  priest- 
hood looked  upon  him  with  suspicion.  The  lower  orders  of  priesthood 
and  people  did  seem  to  consider  him  as  a  Lama  from  the  far  East,  but 
he  did  not  succeed  in  gaining  the  confidence  of  the  Thibetans  to  the 
extent  possessed  by  Dubois  among  the  Brahminical  sects.  The  history 
of  the  latter  author  is  a  peculiar  one :  A  French  priest,  driven  from  his 
native  land  by  the  excesses  of  the  revolution,  he  took  refuge  in  India, 
devoting  himself  for  nearly  twenty  years  to  missionary  labor  among 
the  people,  with  whom  he  became  so  thoroughly  identified  that  when 
his  notes  appeared  they  were  published  at  the  expense  of  the  British 
East  India  Company,  and  distributed  among  its  officials  as  a  text-book. 

THE    MEXICAN    GODDESS   SUCHIQUECAL    EATS    ORDURE. 

The  Mexicans  had  a  goddess,  of  whom  we  read  the  following : 

Father  Fabreya  says,  in  his  commentary  on  the  Codex  Borgianus,  that  the  mother  of 
the  human  race  is  there  represented  in  a  state  of  humiliation,  eating  cuitlatl  {kopros,  Greek). 
The  vessel  in  the  left  hand  of  Suchiquecal  contains  ^'mierda,^^  according  to  the  intei-preter 
of  these  paintings. — (See  note  top.  120,  Kingsborough's  "  Mexican  Antiquities,"  vol.  6.) 

The  Spanish  mierda,  like  the  Greek  kopros,  means  ordure. 

Deities,  created  in  the  ignorance  or  superstitious  fears  of  devotees,  are 
essentially  man-like  in  their  attributes ;  where  they  are  depicted  as  cruel 
and  sanguinary  toward  their  enemies,  the  nation  adoring  them,  no  mat- 
ter how  pacific  to-day,  was  once  cruel  and  sanguinary  likewise.  Anthro- 
pophagous gods  are  worshiped  only  by  the  descendants  of  cannibals, 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UE- ORGIES.  19 

and  excrement-eaters  only  by  the  progeny  of  those  who  were  not  un- 
acquainted with  human  ordure  as  an  article  of  food. 

THE    BACCHIC    ORGIES    OF    THE    GREEKS. 

The  Bacchic  orgies  of  the  Greeks,  while  not  strictly  assimilated  to  the 
ur-orgies,  can  scarcely  be  overlooked  in  this  connection. 
Montfaucon  describes  the  Omophagi  of  the  Greeks : 

Les  Omophagies  6toient  une  fete  des  Grecs  qui  passoient  la  fureur  Bacchique  ;  ils 
s'entortilloient,  dit  Arnobe,  de  serpens  et  mangeoient  des  entrailles  de  Cabri  crues,  dont 
ils  avaient  la  bouche  toute  ensanglantee  ;  cela  est  exprimee  par  le  nom  Omopliage. 
Nous  avons  vu  quelquefois  des  hommes  tous  entortillez  de  serpens  et  particulierement 
dans  Mithras. — (Montfaucon,  "L'Antiquite  expliqu6e,"  tome  2,  book  4,  p.  22.) 

The  references  to  serpent- worship  are  curious,  in  view  of  the  fact  that 
such  ophic  rites  still  are  celebrated  among  the  Mokis,  the  next-door 
neighbors  of  the  Zunis,  and  once  existed  among  the  Zunis  themselves. 
The  allusion  to  Mithras  would  seem  to  imply  that  these  orgies  must  have 
been  known  to  the  Persians  as  well  as  the  Greeks. 

Bryant,  speaking  of  the  Greek  orgies,  uses  this  language : 

Both  in  the  orgies  of  Bacchus  and  in  the  rites  of  Ceres,  as  well  as  of  other  deities, 
one  part  of  the  mysteries  consisted  in  a  ceremony  (omophagia),  at  which  time  they  ate  the 
flesh  quite  crude  with  the  blood.  In  Crete,  at  the  Dionisiaca,  they  used  to  tear  the  flesh 
with  their  teeth  from  the  animal  when  alive. — (Bryant,  "Mythology,"  London,  1775, 
vol.  2,  p.  12.) 

And  again,  on  p.  13  : 

The  Maenules  and  Bacchae  used  to  devour  the  raw  limljs  of  animals  which  they  had 
cut  or  torn  asunder.  *  *  In  the  island  of  Chios  it  was  a  religious  custom  to  tear  a  man 
limb  from  limb,  by  way  of  sacrifice  to  Dionysius.  From  all  which  we  may  learn  one 
sad  truth,  that  there  is  scarce  anything  so  impious  and  unnatural  as  not,  at  times,  to  have 
prevailed. — [Idem. ) 

Faber  tells  us  that — 

The  Cretans  had  an  annual  festival  *  *  *  in  their  frenzy  they  tore  a  living  bull 
with  their  teeth,  and  brandished  serpents  in  their  hands. — (Faber,  "Pagan  Idolatry,*' 
London.  1816,  vol.  2,  p.  265.) 

BACCHIC   ORGIES    IN    NORTH    AMERICA. 

These  orgies  were  duplicated  among  many  of  the  tribes  of  North 
America.  Paul  Kane  describes  the  inauguration  of  Clea-clach,  a  Clallum 
chief  (Northwest  coast  of  British  America) ;  "  he  seized  a  small  dog  and 
began  devouring  it  alive."  He  also  bit  pieces  from  the  shoulders  of  the 
male  by-standers.  (See  "  Artist's  Wanderings  in  North  America,"  Lon- 
don, 1859,  p.  212 ;  also,  the  same  thing  quoted  by  Herbert  Spencer,  in 
"  Descriptive  Sociology.") 


20  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

Bancroft  describes  like  orgies  among  the  Cliimsyans,  of  British  North 
America.  (See  in  ''Native  Eaces  of  the  Pacific  Slope,"  vol.  1,  p.  171.) 
While  the  Nootkas  medicine-men  are  said  to  have  an  orgie  in  which 
"  live  dogs  and  dead  human  bodies  are  seized  and  torn  by  their  teeth ; 
but,  at  least  in  later  times,  they  seem  not  to  attack  the  living,  and  their 
performances  are  somewhat  less  horrible  and  bloody  than  the  wild  orgies 
of  the  northern  tribes."     {Idem,  vol.  1,  p.  202.) 

The  Haidahs,  of  the  same  coast,  indulge  in  an  orgie  in  which  the  per- 
former "  snatches  up  the  first  dog  he  can  find,  kills  him,  and  tearing 
pieces  of  his  flesh,  eats  them."  (Dall,  quoting  Dawson,  in  "  Masks  and 
Labrets,"  Annual  Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology,  Washington, 
D.  C,  1886.) 

In  describing  the  six  secret  soldier  societies  or  bands  of  the  Mandans, 
Maximilian,  of  Wied,  calls  attention  to  the  three  leaders  of  one  band, 
who  were  called  dogs,  who  are  "  obliged,  if  any  one  throws  a  piece  of 
meat  into  the  ashes  or  on  the  ground,  saying,  '  There,  dog,  eat,'  to  fall 
upon  it  and  devour  it  raw,  like  dogs  or  beasts  of  prey."  (Maximilian, 
Prince  of  Wied,  "Travels,"  &c.,  London,  1843,  pp.  356,  446.) 

A  further  multiplication  of  references  is  unnecessary.  The  above 
would  appear  to  be  enough  to  establish  the  existence  of  almost  identical 
orgies  in  Europe,  America,  and  Asia — orgies  in  which  were  perpetuated 
the  ritualistic  use  of  foods  no  longer  employed  by  the  populace,  and  pos- 
sibly commemorating  a  former  condition  of  cannibalism. 

THE    SACRIFICE    OF    THE    DOG   A   SUBSTITUTION    FOE    HUMAN    SACRIFICE. 

It  would  add  much  to  the  bulk  of  this  chapter  to  show  that  the  dog 
has  almost  invariably  been  employed  as  a  substitute  for  man  in  sacrifice. 
Other  animals  have  performed  the  same  vicarious  office,  but  none  to  the 
same  extent,  especially  among  the  more  savage  races.  To  the  American 
Indians  and  other  peoples  of  a  corresponding  stage  of  development  the 
substitution  presents  no  logical  incongruity.  Their  religious  conceptions 
are  so  strongly  tinged  with  zoolatry  that  the  assignment  of  animals  to 
the  role  of  deities  or  of  victims  is  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world ; 
but  their  belief  is  not  limited  to  the  idea  that  the  animal  is  sacred — it 
comprehends,  additionally,  a  settled  appreciation  of  the  fact  that  lycan- 
thropy  is  possible,  and  that  the  medicine-men  possess  the  power  of  trans- 
forming men  into  animals  or  animals  into  men.  Such  a  belief  was 
expressed  to  the  writer  in  the  most  forcible  way,  in  the  village  of  Zuui, 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  21 

in  1881.  The  Indians  were  engaged  in  some  one  of  their  countless 
dances  and  ceremonies  (and  possibly  not  very  far  from  the  time  of  the 
urine  dance),  when  the  dancers  seized  a  small  dog  and  tore  it  limb  from 
limb,  venting  upon  it  every  torture  that  savage  spite  and  malignity  could 
devise.  The  explanation  given  was,  that  the  hapless  cur  was  a  "  Navajo," 
a  tribe  with  which  the  Zunis  have  been  spasmodically  hostile  for  genera- 
tions, and  from  whose  ranks  the  fortunes  of  war  must  have  enabled  them 
to  drag  an  occasional  captive  to  be  put  to  the  torture  and  sacrificed. 

URINE    IN    HUMAN    FOOD CHINOOK    OLIVES. 

The  addition  of  urine  to  human  food  is  mentioned  by  various  writers. 
Speaking  of  the  Chinooks,  Paul  Kane  describes  a  delicacy  manufactured 
by  some  of  the  Indians  among  whom  he  traveled,  and  called  by  him 
''Chinook  olives."  They  were  nothing  more  or  less  than  acorns  soaked 
for  five  months  in  human  urine.  (Kane,  "  Artist's  Wanderings  in  North 
America,"  London,  1859,  p.  187.)  Spencer  copies  Kane's  story  in  his 
Descriptive  Sociology,  article  "Chinooks.". 

UEINE    USED    IN    BREAD-MAKING. 

A  comparatively  late  writer  says  of  the  Mokis  of  Arizona : 

They  are  not  as  clean  in  their  housekeeping  as  the  Navajoes,  and  it  is  hinted  that  they 
sometimes  mix  their  meal  with  chamber-lye  for  these  festive  occasions,  but  I  did  not 
know  that  until  I  talked  with  Mormons  who  had  visited  them. — (J.  H.  Beadle,  "Western 
Wilds,"  Cincinnati,  Ohio,  1878,  p.  279.) 

Beadle  lived  and  ate  with  the  Mokis  for  a  number  of  days.  This 
story,  coming  from  the  Mormons,  may  refer  to  some  imperfectly  under- 
stood ceremonial. 

URINE   USED    IN    THE    MANUFACTURE   OF   SALT. 

Gomara  explains  that,  mixed  with  palm-scrapings,  human  urine  served 
as  salt  to  the  Indians  of  Bogota.* 

SIBERIAN   HOSPITALITY. 

A  curious  manifestation  of  hospitality  has  been  noticed  among  the 
Tchuktchi  of  Siberia : 

Las  Tschuktschi  offrent  leurs  femmes  aux  voyageurs  ;  mais  ceux-ei,  pour  s'en  rendre 
dignes,  doivent  se  soumettre  a  une  epreuve  d§goutante.  La  fille  ou  la  femme  qui  doit 
passer  la  nuit  avec  son  nouvel  hote  lui  pr^sente  une  tasse  pleine  de  son  urine  ;  il  faut 
qu'il  s'en  rince  la  bouche.  S'il  a  ce  courage,  il  est  regard^  comme  un  ami  sincere  ;  sinon, 
il  est  traite  comme  un  ennemi  de  la  famille. — (Dulaure,  "  Des  Di^-init^s  Generatrices," 
Paris,  1825,  p.  400.) 

*Hacen  sal  de  raspaduras  de  palma  y  orinas  de  hombre.— (Grdmara,  Historia  de  las  Indias,  p.  202.) 


22  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

The  presentatign  of  women  to  distinguislied  strangers  is  a  mark  of 
savage  hospitality  noted  all  over  the  world,  but  never  in  any  other  place 
with  the  above  peculiar  accompaniment ;  yet,  Mungo  Park  assures  his 
readers  that,  during  his  travels  in  the  interior  of  Africa,  a  wedding 
occurred  among  the  Moors  while  he  was  asleep.  He  was  awakened  from 
his  doze  by  an  old  woman  bearing  a  wooden  bowl,  whose  contents  she 
discharged  full  in  his  face,  saying  it  was  a  present  from  the  bride. 

Finding  this  to  be  the  same  sort  of  holy  water  with  which  a  Hottentot  priest  is  said  to 
sprinkle  a  newly-married  couple,  he  supposed  it  to  be  a  mischievous  frolic,  but  was  in- 
formed that  it  was  a  nuptial  benediction  from  the  bride's  own  jjerson,  and  which,  on  such 
occasions,  is  always  received  by  the  young  unmarried  Moors  as  a  mark  of  distinguished 
favor. — (Quoted  in  Brand,  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  2,  p.  152,  article 
"Bride- Ales."  See,  also,  Mungo  Park's  "Travels  in  Africa,"  New  York,  1813,  p. 
109.) 

In  the  last  two  citations  religious  or  at  least  superstitious  motives 
obtrude  themselves;  those  to  follow  show  these  in  a  much  more  marked 
degree. 

POISONOUS    MUSHROOMS   USED    IN   UR-ORGIES. 

The  Indians  in  and  around  Cape  Flattery,  on  the  Pacific  coast  of  Brit- 
ish North  America,  retain  the  urine  dance  in  an  unusually  repulsive  form. 
As  was  learned  from  Mr.  Kennard,  U.  S.  Coast  Survey,  whom  the 
writer  had  the  pleasure  of  meeting  in  Washington,  D.  C,  in  1886,  the 
medicine  men  distil,  from  potatoes  and  other  ingredients,  a  vile  liquor, 
which  has  an  irritating  and  exciting  effect  upon  the  kidneys  and  bladder. 
Each  one  who  has  partaken  of  this  dish  immediately  urinates  and  passes 
the  result  to  his  next  neighbor,  who  drinks.  The  effect  is  as  above,  and 
likewise  a  temporary  insanity  or  delirium,  during  which  all  sorts  of  mad 
capers  are  carried  on.  The  last  man  who  quaffs  the  poison,  distilled 
through  the  persons  of  five  or  six  comrades,  is  so  completely  overcome 
that  he  falls  in  a  dead  stupor. 

Precisely  the  same  use  of  a  poisonous  fungus  has  been  described 
among  the  natives  of  the  Pacific  coast  of  Siberia,  according  to  the  learned 
Dr.  J.  W.  Kingsley  (of  Brome  Hall,  Scole,  England).  Such  a  rite  is 
outlined  by  Schultze.  "The  Shamans  of  Siberia  drink  a  decoction  of 
toad-stools  or  the  urine  of  those  who  have  become  narcotized  by  that 
plant."     (Schultze,  '' Fetichism,"  New  York,  1885,  p.  52.*) 

♦Corroborative  testimony  was  also  received  by  the  author  from  Mr.  George  Kennan,  of  Wash- 
ington, D.  C,  who  lived  for  three  years  among  the  Tchuktchi,  Baruts,  and  Yakuts  of  Siberia. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  23 

A   SIMILAR   USE   OF    FUNGI   QUITE    PROBABLY    EXISTED   AMONG   THE 

MEXICANS. 

That  some  such  use  of  poisonous  fungi  was  made  by  other  nations 
would  be  difficult  to  prove  in  the  absence-of  direct  testimony ;  but  many 
incidental  references  are  encountered  which  the  reflective  mind  must  con- 
sider with  care  before  rejecting  as  absolutely  irrelevant  in  this  connec- 
tion. The  Mexicans,  as  we  learn  from  Sahagun,  were  not  ignorant  of 
the  mushroom,  which  is  described  as  the  basis  of  one  of  their  festivals. 
He  says  that  they  ate  the  nanacatl,  a  poisonous  fungus  which  intoxicated 
as  much  as  wine;  after  eating  it,  they  assembled  in  a  plain,  where  they 
danced  and  sang  by  night  and  by  day  to  their  fullest  desire.  This  was 
on  the  first  day,  because  on  the  following  day  they  all  wept  bitterly, 
and  they  said  that  they  were  cleaning  themselves  and  washing  their  eyes 
and  faces  with  their  tears.* 

It  is  true  that  Sahagun  does  not  describe  any  specially  revolting  feature 

in  this  orgie,  but  it  is  equally  patent  that  he  is  describing  from  hearsay, 

and,  probably,  was  not  allowed  to  know  too  much.    In  a  second  reference 

to  this  fungus^  which  he  now  calls  teo-nanacatl,  he  alludes  to  the  toxic 

properties,  which  coincide  closely  with  those  of  the  mushrooms  noted  in 

Siberia  and  on  the  northwest  coast  of  America : 

There  are  some  mushrooms  in  this  country  which  are  called  teo-nanacatl.  They  grow 
under  the  grass  in  the  fields  and  plains  ;  *  *  *  they  are  hurtful  to  the  throat  and 
intoxicate  ;  *  *  *  those  who  eat  them  see  visions  and  feel  flutterings  in  the  heart  ; 
those  who  eat  many  of  them  are  excited  to  lust,  and  even  so  if  they  eat  but  few.f 

The  proof  is  not  at  all  conclusive  that  this  intoxication  was  produced 
as  among  the  Siberian  and  Cape  Flattery  tribes ;  but  it  is  very  odd  that 
the  Aztecs  should  eat  mushrooms  for  the  same  purpose ;  that  they  should 
hold  their  dance  out  in  a  plain  and  by  night  (that  is,  in  a  place  as  remote 
as  possible  from  Father  Sahagun's  inspection).  On  the  second  day,  to 
trust  Sahagun's  explanation,  they  would  appear  to  have  bewailed  their 
behavior  on  the  first;  although  it  should  be  remarked  here  that  cere- 
monial weeping  has  not  been  unknown  to  the  American  aborigines,  and 

.♦Nanacatl,  que  son  los  hongos  malos  que  emborrachan  tan  bien  como  el  vino;  y  se  juntaban  en 
un  llano  despues  de  haberlo  comido,  donde  bailaban  y  cantaban  de  noche  y  de  dia  i.  su  placer ;  y  esto 
el  primer  dia  porque  al  dia  siguiente  lloraban  todos  mucho  y  deeian  que  se  limpiaban  y  lavaban 
los  ojos  y  caras  con  sus  lagrimas.— (Sahagun,  in  Kingsborough's  "Mexican  Antiquities,"  vol. 
7,  p.  308.) 

+  Hay  unos  honguillos  en  esta  tierra  que  sc  llaiuan  teo-nanacatl;  crianse  debajo  del  heno  en  los 
campos  6  pdr.amos  *  *  *  danan  la  garganta  y  emborrachan  *  *  *  jog  que  los  comen  ven 
visfones  y  sientcn  buscas  eu  el  corazon ;  ^  los  que  comen  muchos  de  ellos  provocan  £  luxuria,  y 
aunque  scan  pocos.— (Sahagun,  in  Kingsborough's  "Mexican  Antiquities,"  vol.  7,  p.  369.) 


24  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

may,  in  this  case,  have  been  induced  by  causes  not  revealed  to  the 
stranger.  Lastly,  it  is  important  to  note  that  this  poisonous  fungus  was 
a  violent  excitant,  a  nervous  irritant,  and  an  aphrodisiac. 

Another  early  Spanish  observer,  also  cited  by  Kingsborough,  describes 
them  in  these  terms: 

They  had  another  kind  of  drunkenness,  *  *  *  which  was  with  small  fungi  or  mush- 
rooms, *  *  *  which  are  eaten  raw,  and,  on  account  of  being  bitter,  they  drink  after 
them  or  eat  with  them  a  little  honey  of  bees,  and  shortly  after  that  they  see  a  thousand 
visions,  especially  snakes. 

They  went  raving  mad,  running  about  the  streets  in  a  wild  state 
("  bestial  embriaguez  ").  They  called  these  fungi  "  teo-na-m-catl,"  a  word 
meaning  ''bread  of  the  gods." 

This  author  does  not  allude  to  any  effect  upon  the  kidneys.* 

The  list  of  quotations  is  not  yet  complete,  Tezozomoc,  also  an  author 
of  repute,  relates  that  at  the  coronation  of  Montezuma  the  Mexicans  gave 
wild  mushrooms  to  the  strangers  to  eat;  that  the  strangers  became  drunk, 
and  thereupon  began  to  dance. f  All  of  which  is  a  terse  description  of  a 
drunken  orgie  induced  by  poisonous  mushrooms,  but  not  represented 
with  the  disgusting  sequences  which  would  have  served  to  establish  a 
connection  with  urine  dances. 

Diego  Daran  also  gives  the  particulars  of  the  coronation  of  this  Mon- 
tezuma (the  second  of  the  name  and  the  one  on  the  throne  at  the  date  of 
the  arrival  of  Cortes).  He  says  that,  after  the  usual  human  sacrifices 
had  been  off'ered  up  in  the  temples,  all  went  to  eat  raw  mushrooms,  which 
caused  them  to  lose  their  senses  and  aff'ected  them  more  than  if  they  had 
drunk  much  wine.  So  utterly  beside  themselves  w^ere  they  that  many 
of  them  killed  themselves  with  their  own  hands,  and  by  the  potency  of 
those  mushrooms  they  saw  visions  and  had  revelations  of  the  future,  the 
devil  speaking  to  them  in  their  drunkenness.^     Duran,  of  course,  is  not 

*  Tenian  otra  manera  de  embriaguez  *  *  *  era  con  unos  hongos  6  setas  pequenas  *  *  *  que 
comidos  crudos  y  por  ser  amargos,  beben  tras  eUos  6  comen  con  ellos  un  poco  de  miel  de  abejas,  y 
de  aUi  il  poco  rato,  veian  mil  visiones  y  en  especial  culebras.— (By  the  author  of  "Ritos  Antiguos, 
Sacriflcios  e  idolatrias  de  los  Indies  en  Nueva  Espaiia,"  Kingsborough,  vol.  ix,  p.  17.) 

This  author  seems  to  have  been  the  Franciscan  Fray  Toribio  de  Benvento,  commonly  called  by 
his  Aztec  nickname  of  "  Motolinia,  the  Beggar."  He  is  designated  by  Kingsborough  "the  Un- 
known Franciscan."  because,  through  motives  of  humility,  he  declined  to  subscribe  his  name  to 
his  valuable  writings. 

t  A  los  estranjeros,  les  dieron  d,  comer  hongos  montesinos  que  se  embriagaban  con  ellos  y  con 
esto  entriiron  ^la  danza.— (Tezozomoc,  "  Cronica  Mexicana,"  in  Kingsborough,  "  Mexican  Antiqui- 
ties," vol.  9,  p.  153.) 

J  Ivan  todos  4  comer  hongos  crudos,  con  la  cual  comida  salian  todos  de  juicio  y  quedaban  peores 
que  si  hubieran  bebido  mucho  vino  tan  embriagados  y  fuera  de  sentido  que  muchos  de  ellos  se 
mataban  con  propria  mano  ;  y  con  la  fuerza  de  aquellos  hongos  vian  visiones  y  tenian  rebelaciones 
de  lo  porvenir  hablandoles  el  Demonio  en  aquella  embriaguez.— (Diego  Duran,  lib.  2,  cap.  54,  p. 
564.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  25 

describing  what  he  saw.     Doubtless,  in  that  case,  his  narrative  would 
have  been  more  animated  and,  possibly,  more  to  our  purpose. 

MUSHROOMS    AND    TOADSTOOLS    WORSHIPED    BY    AMERICAN    INDIANS. 

Dorman  is  authority  for  the  statement  that  mushrooms  were  worshiped 
by  the  Indians  of  the  Antilles,  and  toad-stools  by  those  in  Virginia,*  but 
for  w^iat  toxic  or  therapeutic  qualities,  real  or  supposed,  he  does  not  say. 

A    FORMER    USE    OF    FUNGUS    INDICATED    IN    THE    MYTHS    OF    CEYLON, 
AND    IN    THE    LAWS    OF    THE    BRAHMINS. 

On  the  west  shore  of  the  Pacific  Ocean,  aside  from  the  orgies  of  the 
Siberian  Shamans,  no  instance  is  on  record  of  the  use  of  the  mushroom 
or  other  fungus  in  religious  rites  in  the  present  day. 

A  former  use  of  it  is  indicated  in  the  Cingalese  myths,  which  teach 
that- 
Chance  produced  a  species  of  mushroom  called  mattikaf  or  jessathon,  on  which  they 
lived  for  sixty-five  thousand  years  ;  but,  being  determined  to  make  an  equal  division  of 
tliis,  also,  they  lost  it.  Luckily  for  them,  another  creeping  plant  [mistletoe  ?]  called 
badrilata  grew  up,  on  which  they  (the  Brahmins)  fed  for  thirty-five  thousand  years,  but 
which  they  lost  for  the  same  reason  as  the  former  ones. — (Asiatic  Researches,  Calcutta, 
1807,  vol.  7,  p.  441.) 

Among  the  Brahmins  of  the  main-land  no  such  myth  is  related ;  but 
an  English  writer  says  : 

The  ancient  Hindus  held  the  fungus  in  such  detestation  that  Yama,  a  legislator,  sup- 
posed now  to  be  the  judge  of  departed  spirits,  declares  :  "Those  who  eat  mushrooms, 
whether  springing  from  the  ground  or  growing  on  a  tree,  fully  equal  in  guilt  to  the  slayers 
of  Brahmins  and  the  most  despicable  of  all  deadly  sinners." — (Asiatic  Researches,  Cal- 
cutta, 1795,  vol.  4,  p.  311.) 

Dubois  refers  to  the  same  subject.     The  Brahmins,  he  says — 

Have  also  retrenched  from  their  vegetable  food,  which  is  the  great  fund  of  their  sub- 
sistence, all  roots  which  form  a  head  or  bulb  in  the  ground,  such  as  onions,  J  and  those 

*Rushton  M.  Dorman,  "Primitive  Superstitious,"  New  York,  1881,  p.  295. 

tThe  word  "mattika  "  cannot  be  found  in  Forbes' English-Hindustani  Dictionary  (London,  1848.) 
It  may,  perhaps,  belong  to  an  extinct  dialect.  The  word  "  matt,"  mining  "  drunk,"  would  serve 
a  good  purpose  for  this  article  could  a  relationship  be  shown  to  exist  l^tween  it  and  mattika.  This 
the  author  is  of  course  unable  to  do,  being  totally  ignorant  of  Hindustani.  Neither  does  "  badri- 
lata" occur  in  Forbes,  who  interprets  "mistletoe"  as  "banda."  The  contributor  to  the  Asiatic 
Researches,  who  used  the  word,  though  it  meant  "agaric." 

JHiggins  believes  that  the  ancient  Egyptians  had  discovered  similarity  between  the  coats  of  an 
onion  and  the  planetary  spheres,  and  says  that  it  was  called  (by  the  Greeks),  from  being  sacred 
to  the  father  of  ages,  oionoon — onion.  *  *  *  The  onion  was  adored  (as  the  black  stone  in  West- 
minster Abbey  is  by  us)  by  the  Egyptians  for  this  property,  as  a  type  of  the  eternal  renewal  of 
ages.  *  *  *  The  onion  is  adored  in  India,  and  forbidden  to  be  eaten. —  (Quoting  Forster's 
Sketches  of  Hindoos,  p.  35,  Higgins'  Anaealypsis,  vol.  2,  p.  427.) 


26  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

also  which  assume  the  same  shape  above  ground,  like  mushrooms  and  some  others. 
*  *  ■*  Are  we  to  suppose  that  they  had  discovered  something  unwholesome  in  the 
one  species  and  prescribed  the  other  on  account  of  its  fetid  smell  ?  This  I  cannot  decide  ; 
all  the  information  I  have  ever  obtained  from  those  among  them  whom  I  have  consulted 
on  the  reasons  of  their  abstinence  from  them  being  that  it  is  customary  to  avoid  such 
articles. — (Abbe  Dubois,  "People  of  India,"  London,  1817,  p.  117.) 

This  inhibition,  under  such  dire  penalties,  can  have  but  one  meaning. 
In  primitive  times,  the  people  of  India  must  have  been  so  addicted  to 
the  debauchery  induced  by  potions  into  the  composition  of  which  entered 
poisonous  fungi  and  mistletoe  (the  mushroom  "growing  on  a  tree")  and 
the  effects  of  such  debauchery  must  have  been  found  so  debasing  and 
pernicious  that  the  priest-rulers  were  compelled  to  employ  the  same  male- 
dictions which  Moses  proved  of  efficacy  in  withdrawing  the  children  of 
Israel  from  the  worship  of  idols.* 

AN    INQUIRY    INTO    THE    DRUIDICAL    USE    OF    THE    MISTLETOE. 

But  the  question  at  once  presents  itself,  for  what  reason  did  the  Celtic 
Druids  employ  the  much- venerated  mistletoe?  This  question  becomes 
of  deep  significance  in  the  light  of  the  learning  shed  by  Godfrey  Hig- 
gins  and  General  Vallencey  upon  the  derivation  of  the  Druids  from  a 
Buddhistic  or  Brahminical  origin. f 

That  the  mistletoe  was  regarded  as  a  medicine,  and  a  very  potent  one, 
is  easy  enough  to  show.  All  the  encyclopaedias  admit  that  much,  but  the 
accounts  that  have  been  preserved  of  the  ideas  associated  with  this  wor- 
ship are  not  complete  or  satisfactory. 

The  mistletoe,  which  they  (the  Druids)  called  "all-heal,"  used  to  cure  disease. — (Mc- 
Clintock  and  Strong's  Encyclopaedia,  quoting  Stukeley.) 

Within  recent  times  the  mistletoe  has  been  regarded  as  a  valuable  remedy  in  epilepsy 
[Query:  On  the  principle  of  simMa  simUibusf]  and  other  diseases,  but  at  present  is 
not  employed.  *  *  *  The  leaves  have  been  fed  to  sheep  in  time  of  scarcity  of  other 
forage.     [Which  shows,  at  least,  that  it  is  edible.] — (Appleton's  American  Encyclopaedia.) 

Seems  to  possess  no  decided  medicinal  properties. — (International  Encyclopaedia.) 
-  Pliny  mentions  three  varieties;  of  these — 

The  hyphar  is  usefal  for  fattening  cattle,  if  they  ai-e  hardy  enough  to  withstand  the 
purgative  effects  it  produces  at  first.  *  *  *  The  viscum  is  medicinally  of  value  as  an 
emollient,  and  in  cases  of  tumors,  ulcers,  and  the  like. 

*  But  on  the  6th  day  of  the  moon's  age  "  women  walk  in  the  forests  with  a  fan  in  one  hand  and 
eat  certain  vegetables,  in  hope  of  beautiful  children.  See  the  account  given  by  Pliny  of  the  Druid- 
ical  mistletoe  or  viscum,  which  was  to  be  gathered  when  the  moon  was  six  days  old,  as  a  preserva- 
tive from  sterility."— (Sir  William  Jones,  in  Asiatic  Researches,  Calcutta,  1790,  vol.  3,  art.  12.  p.  284; 
quoted  by  Edward  Moor,  "Hindu  Pantheon,"  London,  1810,  p.  334.) 

t  It  is  now,  perhaps,  impossible  to  account  for  the  veneration  in  which  it  was  held  and  the  won- 
derful qualities  which  it  was  supposed  to  possess.— ("The  Druids,"  Reverend  Richard  Smiddy, 
Dublin,  1871,  p.  90.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  27 

Pliny  is  also  quoted  as  saying  that  it  was  considered  of  benefit  to 
women  in  cliildbirtli — "in  conceptum  feminarum  adjiivare  si  omnino 
secum  habeant."*  Pliny  is  also  authority  for  the  reverence  in  which  the 
mistletoe  growing  on  the  robur  (Spanish  "roble,"  or  evergreen  oak)  was 
held  by  the  Druids.  The  robur,  he  says,  is  their  sacred  tree,  and  what- 
ever is  found  growing  upon  it  they  regard  as  sent  from  heaven,  and  as 
the  mark  of  a  tree  chosen  by  God.     (Encyclopaedia  Britannica.) 

Brand  (Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  1,  art.  "Mistletoe") 
cites  the  opinion  of  various  old  authors  that  mistletoe  was  regarded  "  as 
a  medicine  very  likely  to  subdue  not  only  the  epilepsy,  but  all  other  con- 
vulsive disorders.  *  *  *  ^■'j^g  ]^^g]^  veneration  in  which  the  Druids 
were  held  by  the  people  of  all  ranks  proceeded  in  a  great  measure  from 
the  wonderful  cures  they  wrought  by  means  of  the  mistletoe  of  the  oak. 
*  *  *  The  mistletoe  of  the  oak,  which  is  very  rare,  is  vulgarly  said 
to  be  a  cure  for  wind-ruptures  in  children ;  the  kind  which  is  found  upon 
the  apple  is  said  to  be  good  for  fits." 

Much  testimony  may  be  adduced  to  show  that  the  mistletoe  was  valued 
as  an  aphrodisiac,  as  conducive  to  fertility,  as  sacred  to  love,  and,  in  gen- 
eral terms,  an  excitant  of  the  genito-urinary  organs,  which  is  the  very 
purpose  for  which  the  Siberian  and  North  American  medicine- men  em- 
ployed the  fungus,  and  perhaps  the  very  reason  for  which  both  fungus 
and  mistletoe  were  excluded  from  the  Brahminical  dietary. 

Brand  shows  that  mistletoe  "  was  not  unkown  in  the  religious  cere- 
monies of  the  ancients,  particularly  the  Greeks,"  and  that  the  use  of  it, 
savoring  strongly  of  Druidism,  prevailed  at  the  Christmas  service  of 
York  Cathedral  down  to  our  own  day.  (See  in  Brand,  Popular  Antiqui- 
ties, London,  1849,  vol.  1,  p.  524.) 

The  merry  pastime  of  kissing  pretty  girls  under  the  Christmas  mistle- 
toe seems  to  have  a  phallic  derivation.  "This  very  old  custom  has 
descended  from  feudal  times,  but  its  real  origin  and  significance  are 
lost."  (Appleton's  American  Encyclopaedia.)  Brand  shows  that  the 
young  men  observed  the  custom  of  "plucking  off  a  berry  at  each  kiss." 
(Vol.  1,  p.  524.)  Perhaps,  in  former  times,  they  were  required  to  swal- 
low the  berry. 

A  writer  in  Notes  and  Queries  (January  3,  1852,  vol.  5,  p.  13)  quotes 
Nares,  to  the  effect  that  "  the  maid  who  was  not  kissed  under  it  at 

*  Montfiiueon  says  of  the  Druids:  "Ilseroient  que  les  animaux  steriles  deviennent  feconds  en 
buvant  de  I'eau  de  Gui."— (L'antiquite  Expliquee,  Paris,  1722,  tome  2,  part  2,  p.  436— quoting  and 
translating  Pliny.) 


28  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

Christmas  would  not  be  married  in  that  year."  But  another  writer 
(February  28,  1852,  same  volume)  2:)oints  out  that  "  we  should  refer  the 
custom  to  the  Scandinavian  mythology,  wherein  the  mistletoe  is  dedicated 
to  Friga,  the  Venus  of  the  Scandinavians.'"* 

Another  writer  (Notes  and  Queries,  2d  series,  vol,  4,  p.  506)  says : 

As  it  was  supposed  to  possess  the  mystic  power  of  giving  fertility  and  a  power  to  pre- 
serve from  poison,  the  pleasant  ceremony  of  kissing  under  the  mistletoe  may  have  some 
reference  to  this  belief. 

In  vol.  3,  p.  343,  it  is  stated : 

A  Worcestershire  farmer  was  accustomed  to  take  down  his  bough  of  mistletoe  and  give 
it  to  the  cow  that  calved  first  after  New  Year's  Day.  This  was  supposed  to  insure  good 
luck  to  the  whole  dairy.  Cows,  it  may  be  remarked,  as  well  as  sheep,  will  devour  mistle- 
toe with  avidity. 

And  still  another,  in  2d  series,  vol.  6,  p.  523,  recognizes  that  "  the 
mistletoe  was  sacred  to  the  heathen  goddess  of  Beauty,"  and  "it  is  cer- 
tain that  the  mistletoe,  though  it  formerly  had  a  place  among  the  ever- 
greens employed  in  the  Christian  decorations,  was  subsequently  excluded." 
This  exclusion  he  accounts  for  thus  : 

It  is  also  certain  that,  in  the  earlier  ages  of  the  church,  many  festivities  not  at  all  tend- 
ing to  edification  (the  practice  of  mutual  kissing  among  the  rest)  had  gradually  crept  in 
and  established  themselves;  so  that,  at  a  certain  part  of  the  service,  "  statim  clerus, 
ipseque  populus  per  basia  blaude  sese  invicim  oscularetur. " 

This  author  cites  Hone,  Hook,  Moroni,  Bescherelle,  Ducange,  and 
others.  Finally,  in  the  3d  series,  vol.  7,  p.  76,  an  inquirer  asks  "  how 
came  it,  in  Shakespeare's  time,  to  be  considered  '  baleful,'  and,  in  our 
days,  the  most  mirth-provoking  of  plants  ;"  and  still  another  correspond- 
ent, in  same  series,  vol.  7,  p.  237,  claims  that  "mistletoe  will  produce 
abortion  in  the  female  of  the  deer  or  dog." 

FORMER    EMPLOYMENT    OF   AN    INFUSION    OR    DECOCTION   OF    MISTLETOE. 

That  an  infusion  or  decoction  of  the  plant  was  once  in  use  may  be 

gathered  from  the  fact  narrated  by  John  Eliot  Howard : 

Water,  in  which  the  sacred  mistletoe  had  been  immersed,  was  given  to  or  sprinkled 
upon  the  people. — ("  The  Druids  and  their  Religion,"  John  Eliot  Howard,  in  Transactions 
of  Victoria  Institute,  vol.  14,  p.  118,  quoting  "  Le  gui  de  chene  et  les  Druides,"  E.  Mag- 
daleine,  Paris,  1877.t) 

*  It  was  the  only  plant  in  the  world  which  could  harm  Baldur,  the  son  of  Odin  and  Pri^a.  When 
a  branch  of  it  struck  him  he  fell  dead.— (See  in  Bullfinch's  Mythology,  revised  by  Reverend  E.  E. 
Hale,  Boston,  1883,  p.  428.) 

"  AVhen  found  growing  on  the  oak,"  the  mistletoe  "  represented  man."— (Opinion  of  the  French 
writer  Reynaud,  in  his  article  "  Druidism,"  quoted  in  the  Encyclopaedia  Britannica.) 

tSee  notes  on  the  Hindu  Lingam  of  this  monograph. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  29 

THE    MISTLETOE    ALLEGED    TO    HAVE    BEEN    HELD    SACRED    BY    THE 
MOUND-BUILDERS. 

An  American  writer  says,  that  among  the  Mound-builders  the  mistle- 
toe was  "  the  holiest  and  most  rare  of  evergreens,"  and  that  when  human 
sacrifices  were  offered  to  sun  and  moon  the  victim  was  covered  with 
mistletoe,  which  was  burnt  as  an  incense.  (Pidgeon,  "Dee-coo-dah," 
New  York,  1853,  p.  91,  &c.)  Pidgeon  claimed  to  receive  his  knowledge 
from  Indians  versed  in  the  traditions  and  lore  of  their  tribes.* 

Mrs.  Eastman  presents  a  drawing  of  what  may  be  taken  as  the  altar 
of  Haokah,  the  anti-natural  God  of  the  Sioux,  in  which  is  a  representa- 
tion of  a  ''  large  fungus  that  grows  on  trees  "  (query,  mistletoe?),  which, 
if  eaten  by  an  animal,  will  cause  its  death,  f 

THE    MISTLETOE    FESTIVAL    OF    THE    MEXICANS. 

That  the  Mexicans  had  a  reverence  for  the  mistletoe  would  seem  to  be 
assured.  They  had  a  mistletoe  festival.  In  October  they  celebrated 
the  festival  of  the  Neypachtly,  or  bad  eye,  which  was  a  plant  growing 
on  trees  and  hanging  from  them,  gray  with  the  dampness  of  rain ;  es- 
pecially did  it  grow  on  the  different  kinds  of  oak.|  The  informant  says 
he  can  give  no  explanation  of  this  festival. 

VESTIGES   OF   DRUIDICAL    RITES   IN    FRANCE   AT    PRESENT  DAY. 

It  may  be  interesting  to  detect  vestiges  of  Druidical  rites  tenaciously 
adhering  to  the  altered  life  of  modern  civilization. 

In  the  department  of  Seine  et  Oise,  twelve  leagues  from  Paris  (says  a  recent  writer), 
when  a  child  had  a  rupture  (hernia)  he  was  brought  under  a  certain  oak,  and  some  women, 
who  no  doubt  earned  a  living  in  that  trade,  danced  around  the  oak,  muttering  spell- 
words  till  the  child  was  cured,  that  is,  dead. — (Notes  and  Queries,  5th  series,  vol.  7,  p. 
163.) 

It  has  already  been  shown  that  the  Druids  ascribed  this  very  medical 
quality  to  the  mistletoe  of  the  oak. 

Other  curious  instances  of  survival  present  themselves  in  the  linguist- 
ics of  the  subject.    The  French  word  "gui,"  meaning  mistletoe,  is  not  of 

*See  also  Ellen^Russell  Emerson,  "Indian  Myths,"  Boston,  1884,  p.  331,  wherein  Pidgeon  is 
quoted. 

t "  Legends  of  the  Sioux,"  Eastman,  New  York,  1849,  p.  210.  Readers  interested  in  the  subject  of 
Indian  altars  will  find  descriptions,  with  colored  plates,  in  the  coming  work  of  Surgeon  Washington 
Matthews,  U.  S.  Army,  and  in  the  "  Snake  dance  of  the  Moquis  of  Arizona,"  by  the  author. 

tNeypachtly,  quiere  deeir  "  mal  ojo;"  es  una  yerva  que  nace  en  los  arboles  y  cuelga  de  ellos, 
parda  con  la  humedad  de  las  aguas,  especialmente  se  cria  en  los  encinales  y  robles.— (Diego  Duran, 
vol.  3,  cap.  16,  p.  391J^.    Manuscript  copy  in  Congressional  Library,  Washington,  D.  C.) 


30  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

Latin  but  of  Druiclical  derivation,  and  so  the  Spanish  "agiiinaldo,"  mean- 
ing Christmas  or  New  Year's  present,  conserves  the  cry,  slightly  altered, 
of  the  Druid  priest  to  the  "gui"  at  the  opening  of  the  new  year. 

cow    DUNG   AND    COW    UEINE    IN    RELIGION. 

The  sacrificial  value  of  cow  dung  and  cow  urine  throughout  India  and 

Thibet  is  much  greater  than  the  reader  might  be  led  to  infer  from  the 

brief  citation  already  noted  from  Max  Miiller. 

Hindu  merchants  in  Bokhara  now  lament  loudly  at  the  sight  of  a  piece  of  cow's  flesh, 
and  at  same  time  mix  with  their  food  that  it  may  do  them  good  the  urine  of  a  sacred 
cow  kept  in  that  place.— (Erman,  "Siberia,"  London,  1848,  vol.  1,  p.  384.) 

Picart  narrates  that  the  Brahmans  fed  grain  to  a  sacred  cow  and 
afterward  searched  in  the  ordure  for  the  sacred  grains,  which  they 
picked  out  whole,  drying  them  and  administering  to  the  sick  not  merely 
as  a  medicine,  but  as  a  sacred  thing.* 

Not  only  among  the  people  of  the  lowlands,  but  among  those  of  the 

foot-hills  of  the  Himalayas  as  well,  do  these  rites  find  place;  "the  very 

dung  of  the  cow  is  eaten  as  an  atonement  for  sin,  and  its  urine  is  used 

in  worship."    (Notes  on  the  Hill  Tribes  of  the  Neilgherries,  Short,  Trans. 

Ethnol.  Society,  London,  1868,  p.  268.) 

The  greatest,  or,  at  any  rate,  the  most  convenient  of  all  purifiers  is  the  urine  of  a  cow  ; 
*  *  *  images  are  sprinkled  with  it.  No  man  of  any  pretentions  to  piety  or  cleanli- 
ness would  pass  a  cow  in  the  act  of  staling  without  receiving  the  holy  stream  in  his  hand 
and  sipping  a  few  drops.  *  *  *  Jf  the  animal  be  retentive,  a  pious  expectant  will 
impatiently  apply  his  finger,  and  by  judicious  tickling  excite  the  grateful  flow.  — (Moor's 
"Hindu  Pantheon,"  London,  1810,  p.  148.) 

Dubois,  in  his  chapter  "  Restoration  to  the  Caste,"  says  that  a  Hindu 
penitent  "  must  drink  i\n^.  panchakaryam — a  word  which  literally  signi- 
fies the  five  things,  namely,  milk,  butter,  curd,  dung,  an<l  urine,  all 
mixed  together,"  and  he  adds  : 

The  urine  of  the  cow  is  held  to  be  the  most  efficacious  of  any  for  purifving  all  imagina- 
ble uncleanness.     I  have  often  seen  the  superstitious  Hindu  accompanying  these  animals 

*  Apres  avoir  donne  clu  riz  en  pot,  a  manger  aux  vaches  ils  vent  fouiUer  dans  la  bouze  et  en  retir- 
eut  les  grains  qu'ils  trouvent  entiers.  lis  font  sc'-cher  ces  grains  et  les  donnent  a,  leurs  malades,  non 
seulement  comme  un  remede  mais  encore  comme  una  chose  sainte.— (Picart,  "Codtumes  et  Cere- 
monies n'ligieuses,"  &e.,  Amsterdam,  1729,  vol.  7,  p.  18.) 

This  is  neither  better  nor  worse  than  the  custom  of  the  Indians  of  Texas,  Florida,  and  California, 
herein  before  described. 
Chez  les  Indiens,  la  bouze  de  la  vache  est  tres  sainte. — (Picart,  Idem.  vol.  6,  part  2,  p.  191-193.) 
Picart  also  discloses  that  the  Banians  swear  by  a  cow. — (Idem,  vol.  7,  p.  16.) 

The  author  of  this  article  learned  while  campaigning  with  General  Crook  against  the  hostile 
Sioux  and  Cheyennes  in  1876  and  1877  that  the  Sioux  and  Assinniboines  had  a  form  of  oath  sworn 
to  while  the  affiant  held  in  each  hand  a  piece  of  buflfalo  chip. 

A  small  quantity  of  the  urine  (of  the  cow)  is  daily  sipped  by  some  (of  the  Hindus).— (Asiatic  Re- 
searches, Calcutta,  1805,  vol.  8,  p.  81.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  31 

when  in  the  pasture  and  watching  the  moment  for  receiving  the  urine  as  it  fell  in  vessels 
which  he  had  brought  for  the  purpose,  to  carry  it  home  in  a  fresh  state  ;  or,  catching  it 
in  the  hollow  of  his  hand,  to  bedew  his  face  and  all  his  body.  When  so  used,  it  removes 
all  external  impurity,  and  when  taken  internally,  which  is  very  common,  it  cleanses  all 
within.— (Abbe  Dubois,  "People  of  India,"  London,  1817,  p.  29.) 

Very  frequently  the  excrement  is  first  reduced  to  ashes.     The  monks 

of  Chivem,  called  Pandarones,  smear  their  faces,  breasts,  and  arms  with 

the  ashes  of  cow  dung ;  they  run  through  the  streets  demanding  alms, 

very  much  as  the  Zuni  actors  demanded  a  feast,  and  chant  the  praises  of 

Chivem,  while  they  carry  a  bundle  of  peacock  feathers  in  the  hand  and 

wear  the  lingam  at  the  neck.* 

cow   DUNG   ALSO    USED    BY   THE   ISRAELITES. 

In  another  place  Dulaure  calls  attention  to  the  similar  use  among  the 
Hebrews  of  the  ashes  of  the  dung  of  the  red  heifer  as  an  expiatory 
sacrifice,  t 

HUMAN    ORDURE    USED    IN    FOOD    BY    THE    ISRAELITES. 

Among  the  Banians  of  India  proselytes  are  obliged  by  the  Brahmans 
to  eat  cow  dung  for  six  months.  They  begin  with  one  pound  daily,  and 
diminish  from  day  to  day.  A  subtle  commentator,  says  Picart,  might 
institute  a  comparison  between  the  nourishment  of  these  fanatics  and  the 
dung  of  cows  which  the  Lord  ordered  the  prophet  Ezekiel  to  mingle 
with  his  food. I 

This  was  the  opinion  held  by  Voltaire  on  this  subject.  Speaking  of 
the  prophet  Ezekiel,  he  said,  "  He  is  to  eat  bread  of  barley,  wheat,  beans, 
lentils,  and  millet,  and  to  cover  it  with  human  excrement."  It  is  thus, 
he  says,  that  the  "children  of  Israel  shall  eat  their  bread  defiled  among 
the  nations  among  which  they  shall  be  banished."     But,  "after  having 

*Les  moines  de  Chivem  sout  nommes  Pandarons.  lis  se  barbouillent  le  visage,  la  poitrine,  et 
Ics  bras  avec  des  cendres  de  bouse  de  vache;  ils  parcourent  les  rues,  demandent  raumone  et  chan- 
tent  les  louanges  de  Chivem,  cu  portant  un  paquet  do  plumes  de  paona  la  main  etle  lingam  pendu 
au  cou. — (Dulaure,  "Des  Divinites  generatrices,"  Paris,  1825,  p.  105.) 

tLes  Hebreux  sacrifiaient  et  faisaient  brftler  la  vache  rousse,  dont  les  cendres  melees  avec  de 
I'eau  scrvaient  aux  expiations.  Chez  les  Indiens,  les  cendres  de  la  bouse  de  vache  sont  egalement 
employees  aux  expiations.— fDulaure,  idem,  chap.  1,  pp.  23,  24.) 

They  shall  burn  in  the  fire  their  dung.— (Levit.,  xvi:  27.) 

Her  blood  with  her  dung  shall  he  burn. — (Numbers,  xix:  5.) 

%  Disons  un  mot  de  la  maniere  dont  les  Proselytes  des  Banians  sont  obligt'S  de  vivre  les  premiers 
mois  de  leur  conversion.  Les  Brahmines  leur  ordonnent  de  meler  de  la  fiente  de  la  vache  dans 
tout  ce  qu'ils  mangent  pendant  ce  tems  de  regeneration.  *  *  *  Que  ne  diroit  pas  ici  un  eom- 
mentateur  subtil  qui  voudroit  comparer  la  nourriturc  de  ces  proselytes  avec  les  ordres  que  Dieu 
donna  autrefois  a  Ezechicl  de  meler  de  la  fiente  de  vache  dans  ses  alimens.  Ezekiel,  iv.— (Picart. 
"  Coutumes  et  ceremonies  religieuses,"  &c.,  Amsterdam,  1729,  vol.  7,  p.  15.)  "  And  thou  shalt  eat 
it  as  barley  cakes,  and  thou  shalt  eat  it  with  dung  that  cometh  out  of  man,  in  their  sight." — 
(Ezekiel,  iv:  12.) 


32  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

eaten  this  bread  of  affliction,  God  permits  him  to  cover  it  with  the  ex- 
crement of  cattle  simply."  * 

The  view  entertained  by  some  biblical  commentators  is  that  the  ex- 
crement was  used  for  baking  the  bread;  but  if  this  be  true,  why  should 
human  faeces  be  used  for  such  a  purpose.  (Consult  Lange's  Commentaries, 
article  ''Ezekiel,"  and  McClintock  and  Strong's  Cyclopaedia,  article 
''Dung.") 

There  is  also  a  purification  of  the  soul  of  the  dying  by  the  same  peculiar 
methods.  In  Coromandel,  the  dying  man  is  so  placed  that  his  face  will 
come  under  the  tail  of  a  cow ;  the  tail  is  lifted  and  the  cow  excited  to  void 
her  urine.  If  the  urine  fall  upon  the  face  of  the  sick  man,  the  people 
cry  out  with  joy,  considering  him  to  be  one  of  the  blessed,  but  if  the 
sacred  animal  be  in  no  humor  to  gratify  their  wishes,  they  are  greatly 

afflicted,  t 

Monier  Williams  repeats  almost  what  Milller  says  about  the  Parsis. 
A  young  Parsi  undergoes  a  sort  of  confirmation,  during  which  "  he  is 
made  to  drink  a  small  quantity  of  the  urine  of  a  bull. ' '  (Monier  AVilliams, 
''Modern  India,"  London,  1878,  p.  178.)  And  in  describing  the  crema- 
tion of  a  Hindoo  corpse  at  Bombay,  the  same  author  relates  that  the 
ashes  of  the  pyre  were  sprinkled  with  water,  a  cake  of  cow  dung  placed 
in  the  center,  and  around  it  a  small  stream  of  cow  urine  ;  upon  this  were 
placed  plantain  leaves,  rice-cakes,  and  flowers.     ("  Modern  India,"  p.  65.) 

THE   ASSYEIAN   VENUS    HAD    OFFERINaS    OF    DUNG   PLACED    UPON    HER 

ALTARS. 

Another  authority  states  that  ''  the  zealous  adorers  of  Siva  rub  the 
forehead,  breast,  and  shoulders  with  ashes  of  cow  dung;"  and  further 
he  adds : 

It  is  very  remarkable  that  the  Assyrian  Venus,  according  to  Lncian,  had  also  offerings 
of  dung  placed  upon  her  altars.— (Maurice,  "Indian  Antiquities,"  London,  1800,  vol.  1, 
pp.  172,  173.) 

Speaking  of  the  sacrifice  called  Poojah,  Maurice  says: 

The  Brahman  prepares  a  place  which  is  purified  with  dried  cow  dung,  with  which  the 
pavement  is  spread,  and  the  room  is  sprinkled  with  the  urine  of  the  same  animal. — 
{Idem,  vol.  1,  p.  77.) 

*"I1  doit  manger  du  pain  du  froment,  d'orge,  de  fives,  de  lentilles,  de  millets  et  le  couvrir  d'ex- 
creinens  humains,"  etc.— (Voltaire,  Essais  sur  les  Moeurs,  vol.  1,  p.  195,  Paris,  1785.) 

t  Au  Coromandel,  ils  mettent  le  visage  du  mourant  sur  le  derricre  d'une  vache,  levent  la  queue 
de  Tanimal  et  I'excitent  a  laeher  son  urine  sur  le  visage  *  *  *  si  I'urine  coule  sur  la  face  du 
maliide,  I'assemblee  s'ecrie  de  joye  et  le  compte  parmi  les  bienheureux,  mais  *  *  *  sila  vache 
n'est  pas  d'humeur  d'uriner,  on  s'en  aflaige.— (Picart,  "  Coatumes  et  ceremonies  religieuses,"  Ac, 
Amsterdam,  1729,  vol.  7,  p.  28.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  33 

In  one  of  the  Hindu  fasts  the  devotee  adopts  these  disgusting  excreta 
as  his  food.  On  the  fourth  day  ''his  disgusting  beverage  is  the  urine 
of  tlie  cow ;  the  fifth,  the  excrement  of  that  holy  animal  is  his  allotted 
food."     (Maurice,  ''Indian  Antiquities,"  London,  1800,  vol.  5,  p.  222.) 

Maurice  cites  five  meritorious  kinds  of  suicide,  in  the  second  of  which 
the  Hindu  devotee  is  described  as  "covering  himself  with  cow  dung, 
setting  it  on  fire,  and  consuming  himself  therein."  (Maurice,  "Indian 
Antiquities,"  London,  1800,  vol.  2,  p.  49.*) 

Doors  of  houses  are  smeared  with  cow  dung  and  nimba  leaves,  as  a 
preservative  from  poisonous  reptiles.  (Moor's  "Hindu  Pantheon,"  Lon- 
don, 1810,  p.  23.) 

THE  SACRED  COW's  EXCRETA  A  SUBSTITUTE  FOR  HUMAN  SACRIFICE. 

The  foregoing  testimony,  which  could  readily  be  swelled  in  volume, 
proves  the  sacred  character  of  these  excreta,  which  may  be  looked  upon 
as  substitutes  for  a  more  perfect  sacrifice.  In  the  early  life  of  the  Hin- 
dus it  is  more  than  likely  that  the  cow  or  the  heifer  was  slaughtered 
by  the  knife  or  burnt ;  as  population  increased  in  density,  domestic  cattle 
became  too  costly  to  be  offered  as  a  frequent  oblation,  and  on  the  princi- 
ple that  the  part  represents  the  whole,  hair,  milk,  butter,  urine,  and 
ordure  superseded  the  slain  carcass,  while  the  incinerated  excrement  was 
made  to  do  duty  as  a  burnt  sacrifice.! 

It  was  hardly  probable  that  such  practices,  or  an  explanation  of  the 
causes  which  led  to  their  adoption  and  perpetuation,  should  have  escaped 
the  keen  criticism  of  E.  B.  Tylor.     He  says : 

For  the  means  of  some  of  his  multifarious  histratious,  the  Hindu  lias  recourse  to  the 
sacred  cow.  *  *  *  The  Parsi  religion  i^rescribes  a  system  of  lustration  which  well 
shows  its  common  origin  with  that  of  Hinduism  by  its  similar  use  of  cow's  urine  and 
water.  *  *  *  Applications  of  "mraji*/,"  washed  off  with  water,  form  part  of  the 
daily  religious  rites,  as  well  as  of  such  special  ceremonies  as  the  naming  of  the  new-born 
child,  the  putting  on  of  the  sacred  cord,  the  purification  of  the  mother  after  childbirth,  and 
the  purification  of  him  who  has  touched  a  corpse. — (E.  B.  Tylor,  "Primitive  Culture," 
London,  1871,  vol.  2,  pp.  396,  397.) 

*  The  Hebrew  prophets  bedaubed  themselves  with  Ordure  and  sat  on  dung-heaps,  while  the  re- 
calcitrant people  of  Israel  were  warned:  "Behold,  I  will  spread  dung  upon  your  faces,  even  the 
dung  of  your  solemn/easts,  and  one  shall  take  you  away  with  it."— (Malachi,  2:  3.) 

tSuch  an  economic  tendency  in  the  sacrificial  practices  of  the  Parsis  is  shown  by  Tylor.  The 
Vcdic  sacrifice,  Agnishtoma,  required  thataninials  should  be  slain  and  their  flesh  partly  committed 
to  the  gods  by  fire,  partly  eaten  by  sacrificers  and  priests.  The  Parsi  ceremony,  Izcshne,  formal 
successor  of  this  bloody  rite,  requires  no  animal  to  be  killed,  but  it  suffices  to  place  the  hair  of  an 
ox  in  a  vessel  and  show  it  to  the  fire.— (Primitive  Culture,  E.  B.  Tylor,  New  York,  1874  vol  2 
p.  400.) 


34  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

This  citation  is  valuable  because  it  supports  with  such  authority  the 
conclusion  which  must  have  entered  the  minds  of  all  who  have  scanned 
these  pages,  that  the  Parsi  and  Brahminical  ceremonials  are  offshoots 
from  a  common  stock.  But  of  even  greater  value  is  the  testimony,  also 
collected  by  Tylor,  in  regard  to  substitutive  sacrifices,  in  which  the  fact 
is  made  to  appear  that  the  sacred  cow  of  India  takes  the  place  originally 
occupied  by  a  human  victim.*  His  explanation  is  of  such  interest  that 
space  may  well  be  claimed  for  it  in  this  chapter : 

It  will  help  us  to  realize  how  the  sacrifice  of  an  animal  may  atone  for  a  human  life,  if 
we  notice  in  South  Africa  how  a  Zulu  will  redeem  a  lost  child  from  the  finder  by  a  bullock, 
or  a  Kimbunda  will  expiate  the  blood  of  a  slave  by  the  offering  of  an  ox,  whose  blood 
will  wash  away  the  other.  For  instances  of  the  animal  substituted  for  man  in  sacrifice, 
the  following  may  serve  :  Among  the  Khonds  of  Orissa,  where  Colonel  MacPherson  was 
engaged  in  putting  down  the  sacrifice  of  human  victims  by  the  sect  of  the  Earth-goddess, 
they  at  once  began  to  discuss  the  plan  of  sacrificing  cattle  by  way  of  substitutes.  Now, 
there  is  some  reason  to  think  that  this  same  course  of  ceremonial  change  may  account  for 
the  following  sacrificial  practice  in  the  other  Khond  sect.  It  appears  that  those  who  wor- 
ship the  Light-god  hold  a  festival  in  his  honor,  when  they  slaughter  a  buffalo  in  com- 
memoration of  the  time  when,  as  they  say,  the  Earth-goddess  was  prevailing  on  men  to 
offer  human  sacrifices  to  her,  but  the  Light-god  sent  a  tribe-deity  who  crushed  the  bloody- 
minded  Earth-goddess  under  a  mountain  and  dragged  a  buffalo  out  of  the  jungle,  saying  : 
"  Liberate  the  man  and  sacrifice  the  buffalo."  It  looks  as  though  this  legend,  divested 
of  its  mythic  garb,  may  really  record  a  historical  substitution  of  animal  for  human  sacrifice. 

In  Ceylon,  the  exorcist  will  demand  the  name  of  the  demon  possessing  a  demoniac, 
and  the  patient  in  frenzy  answers,  giving  the  demon's  name,  "  I  am  So-and-So  ;  I  demand 
a  human  sacrifice,  and  I  will  not  go  without."  The  victim  is  promised,  the  patient  comes 
to  from  the  fit,  and  a  few  weeks  later  the  sacrifice  is  made,  but  instead  of  a  man  they 
offer  a  fowl.  Classic  examples  of  a  substitution  of  this  sort  maybe  found  in  the  sacrifice 
of  a  doe  for  a  virgin  to  Artemis  in  Laodicaea,  a  goat  for  a  boy  to  Dionysos  at  Potniae. 

There  appears  to  be  a  Semitic  connection  here,  as  there  clearly  is  in  the  story  of  the 
^olians  of  Tenedos  sacrificing  to  Melikertes  (Melkarth)  instead  of  a  neW-born  child  a  new- 
born calf,  shoeing  it  with  buskins  and  tending  the  mother  cow  as  if  a  human  mother. — 
("Primitive  Culture,"  E.  B.  Tylor,  London,  1871,  vol.  2,  p.  366  ;  or  in  New  York  edi- 
tion, 1879,  vol.  2,  lop.  403,  404.) 

Inman  takes  the  ground  that  the  very  same  substitution  occurred 
among  the  Hebrews.     Commenting  upon  I  Kings :  xix,  18,  he  says  : 

In  the  Vulgate,  the  passage  is  thus  rendered  :  "They  say  to  these,  'Sacrifice  the  men 
who  adore  the  calves  ;'  while  the  Septuagint  renders  the  words  '  Sacrifice  men,  for  the 
calves  have  come  to  an  end,'  indicating  a  reversion  to  human  sacrifice."  —  (Inman, 
Ancient  Faiths  Embodied  in  Ancient  Names,  London,  1878,  article  "Hosea."  Consult 
also  Ragozin,  "Assyria,"  New  York,  1887,  pp.  127,  128.) 

*  Dubois  declares  that  in  the  Atharvana  Veda  "bloody  sacrifices  of  victims  (human  not  ex- 
cepted) are  there  prescribed."— (Dubois,  "People  of  India,"  London,  1817,  p.  341.)  And  in  those 
parts  of  India  where  human  sacrifice  had  been  abolished,  a  substitutive  ceremony  was  practiced 
"  by  forming  a  human  figure  of  flour  paste  or  clay,  which  they  carry  into  the  temple  and  there  cut 
off  its  head  and  mutilate  it,  in  various  ways,  in  presence  of  the  idols."— (/c^ew,  p.  490.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  35 

If  the  cow  have  displaced  a  human  victim,  may  it  not  be  within  the 
Hniits  of  probability  that  the  ordure  and  urine  of  the  sacred  bovine  are 
substitutes  not  only  for  the  complete  carcass,  but  that  they  symbolize  a 
former  use  of  human  excreta?*  The  existence  of  ur-orgies  has  been 
indicated  in  Siberia,  where  the  religion  partakes  of  many  of  the  charac- 
teristics of  Buddhism.  The  minatory  phraseology  of  the  Brahminical 
inhibition  of  the  use  of  the  fungi  which  enter  into  these  orgies  has  been 
given  verbatim;  so  that,  even  did  no  better  evidence  exist,  enough  has 
been  presented  to  open  up  a  wide  range  of  discussion  as  to  the  former 
area  of  distribution  of  loathsome  and  disgusting  ceremonials  which  are 
now  happily  restricted  to  small  and  constantly  diminishing  zones. 

HUMAN    ORDURE    AND    URINE    STILL    USED    IN    INDIA. 

It  is  well  to  remember,  however,  that  in  India  the  more  generally 
recognized  efficacy  of  cow  urine  and  cow  dung  has  not  blinded  the  fanati- 
cal devotee  to  the  necessity  of  occasionally  having  recourse  to  the  human 
product. 

At  about  ten  leagues  to  the  southward  of  Seringapatam  there  is  a  village  called  Nan- 
ja-na-gud,  in  which  there  is  a  temple  famous  all  over  the  Mysore.  Amongst  the  number 
of  votaries  of  every  caste  who  resort  to  it,  a  great  proportion  consists  of  barren  women, 
who  bring  offerings  to  the  god  of  the  place,  and  pray  for  the  gift  of  fruitfulness  in  return. 
But  the  object  is  not  to  be  accomplished  by  the  offerings  and  prayers  alone,  the  disgusting 
part  of  the  ceremony  being  still  to  follow.  On  retiring  from  the  temj^le,  the  woman  and 
her  husband  repair  to  the  common  sewer  to  which  all  the  pilgrims  resort  in  obedience  to 
the  calls  of  nature.  There  the  husband  and  wife  collect,  with  their  hands,  a  quantity  of 
the  ordure,  which  they  set  apart,  with  a  mark  upon  it,  that  it  may  not  be  touched  by  any 
one  else ;  and  with  their  fingers  in  this  condition,  they  take  the  water  of  the  sewer  in  the 
hollow  of  their  hands  and  drink  it.  Then  they  perform  ablution  and  retire.  In  two  or 
three  days  they  return  to  the  place  of  filth,  to  visit  the  mass  of  ordure  which  they  left. 
They  turn  it  over  with  their  hands,  break  it,  and  examine  it  in  every  possible  way  ;  and, 
if  they  find  that  any  insects  or  vermin  are  engendered  in  it,  they  consider  it  a  favorable 
prognostic  for  the  woman. — (Abbe  Dubois,  "People  of  India,"  London,  1817,  p.  411. f) 

EXCREMENT    GODS    OF    ROMANS    AND    EGYPTIANS. 

The  Romans  and  Egyptians  went  farther  than  this ;  they  had  gods  of 
excrement,  whose  special  function  was  the  care  of  latrines  and  those  wdio 

*  After  the  .Tews  had  been  humbled  by  the  Lord  and  made  to  mingle  human  ordure  with  their 
broad,  the  punishment  was  mitigated  by  substitution.  "Then  he  said  unto  me,  Lo !  I  have  given 
thee  cow's  dung  for  man's  dung,  and  thou  shalt  prepare  thy  bread  therewith."— (Ezeliiel,  iv  :  15.) 

t  Previous  notes  upon  the  Grand  Lama  of  Thibet  and  upon  the  abominable  practices  of  the 
Agozis  and  Gurus  seem  to  be  pertinent  in  this  connection.    See  page  17. 


36  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

frequented  them.     Torquemada,  a  Spanish  author  of  high  repute,  ex- 
presses this  in  very  plain  language  : 

I  assert  that  they  used  to  adore  (as  St.  Clement  writes  to  St.  James  the  Less)  stinking 
and  filthy  privies  and  water-closets  ;  and,  what  is  viler  and  yet  more  abominable,  and  an 
occasion  for  our  tears  and  not  to  be  borne  with  or  so  much  as  mentioned  by  name,  they 
adored  the  noise  and  wind  of  the  stomach  when  it  expels  from  itself  any  cold  or  flatulence  ; 
and  other  things  of  the  same  kind,  which,  according  to  the  same  saint,  it  would  be  a  shame 
to  name  or  describe.* 

In  the  preceding  lines  Torquemada  refers  to  the  Egyptians  only,  but, 
as  will  be  seen  by  examining  the  Spanish  notes  below,  his  language  is 
almost  the  same  when  speaking  of  the  Romans.f  The  Roman  goddess 
was  called  Cloacina.  She  was  one  of  the  first  of  the  Roman  deities,  and 
is  believed  to  have  been  named  by  Romulus  himself.  Under  her  charge 
were  the  various  cloacse,  sewers,  privies,  &c.,  of  the  Eternal  City.| 

ISRAELITISH    DUNG    GODS. 

Dulaure  quotes  from  a  number  of  authorities  to  show  that  the  Israelites 
and  Moabites  had  the  same  ridiculous  and  disgusting  ceremonial  in  their 
worship  of  Bel-phegor.  The  devotee  presented  his  naked  posterior  before 
the  altar  and  relieved  his  entrails,  making  an  offering  to  the  idol  of  the 

*Digo  que  adoraban  (segun  San  Clemente  escrive  d  Santiago  el  menor),  las  hediondas  y  sucias 
neeessarias  y  latrinas;  y  lo  que  es  peor  y  mas  abominable  y  digno  de  llorar  y  no  de  sufrir,  ni  nom- 
brarle  por  su  nombre,  que  adoraban,  el  estruendo  y  crugimiento,  que  haee  el  vientre  quando  des- 
pide  de  si  alguna  frialdad  6  ventosidad  y  otras  semejantes,  que  segun  el  mismo  santo  es  verguenza 
nombrarlas  y  deeirlas.— (Torquemada,  Monarchia  Indiana,  lib.  6,  chap.  13,  Madrid,  1723.) 

t  Los  Romanes  *  *  *  eonstituieron  Diosa  a  los  hediondas  neeesarias  6  latrinas  y  la  adoraban  y 
consagraban  y  ofrecian  sacrifieios. — (Torquemada,  Monarchia  Indiana,  lib.  6,  chap.  16,  Madrid,  1723.) 

t  There  is  another  opinion  concerning  Cloacina— that  she  was  one  of  the  names  given  to  a  statue 
of  Venus  found  in  the  Cloaca  Maxima.  Smith,  in  his  Dictionary  of  Antiquities,  London,  1850,  ex- 
presses this  view,  and  seems  to  be  followed  by  the  American  and  Britannic  Encyclopaedias.  Lem- 
priere  defines  Cloacina:  "  A  goddess  of  Rome,  who  presided  over  the  Cloacse — some  suppose  her  to 
be  Venus— whose  statue  was  found  in  the  Cloaca),  whence  the  name."  See,  also,  in  Anthon's 
Classical  Dictionary. 

Higgins  says  that  "  the  famous  statue  of  Venus  Cloacina  was  found  in  them  (the  Cloacae  Max- 
imae)  by  Romulus." — (Anacalypsis,  foot-note  to  p.  624,  London,  1836.) 

Torquemada  insists  that  the  Romans  borrowed  this  goddess  from  the  Egyptians:  "A  esta 
diosa  llamaron  Cloacina,  Diosa  que  presidia  en  sus  albanares  y  los  guardaba,  que  son  los  lugares 
donde  van  d,  parar  todaslas  suciedades,  inmundicias,  y  vascosidadesde  una  Republica. "^Torque- 
mada, lib.  6,  chap.  17.) 

Torquemada,  who  makes  manifest  in  his  writings  an  intimate  acquaintance  with  Greek  and 
Roman  mythology,  fortifies  his  position  by  references  from  St.  Clement,  Itinerar,  lib.  5;  Lactan- 
tius,  Divinas  Ejus,  lib.  1,  chap.  20 ;  Epistle  of  St.  Clement  to  St.  James  the  Less,  Eusebius,  de  Prae- 
peratio  Evangil.,  chap.  1 ;  St.  Augustine,  Civ.  Dei,  lib.  2,  chap.  22  ;  Diod,  Sic,  lib.  1 ,  chap.  2,  and  lib. 
2,  chap.  4 ;  Lucian,  Dialogues,  Cicero,  de  Nat.  Deorum,  Pliny,  lib.  10,  chap.  27,  and  lib.  11,  chap.  21 ; 
Theodoret,  lib.  3,  de  Evangelii  veritatis  oognitione. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  37 

foul  emanations.*     Dung  gods  are  also  mentioned  as  having  been  known 
to  the  chosen  people  during  the  time  of  their  idolatry. f 

Besides  Suchiquecal,  the  mother  of  the  gods,  who  has  been  represented 
as  eating  excrement  in  token  of  humiliation,  the  Mexicans  had  other 
deities  whose  functions  were  more  or  less  clearly  complicated  with  alvine 
dejections.  The  most  prominent  of  these  was  Ixcuina,  called,  also,  Tla- 
golteotl,  of  whom  Brasseur  de  Bourbourg  speaks  in  these  terms : 

The  goddess  of  ordure,  or  Tla(;olquani,  the  eater  of  ordure,  because  she  presided  over 
loves  and  carnal  pleasures. { 

Mendieta  mentions  her  as  masculine,  and  in  these  terms : 
The  god  of  vices  and  dirtinesses,  whom  they  called  Tlazulteotl.  I 

Bancroft  speaks  of  "  the  Mexican  goddess  of  carnal  love,  called  Tlazolte- 
cotl,  Ixcuina,  Tlacloquani,"  &c.,  and  says  that  she — 

*  *  *  had  in  her  service  a  crowd  of  dwarfs,  buffoons,  and  hunchbacks,  who  diverted 
her  with  their  songs  and  dances  and  acted  as  messengers  to  such  gods  as  she  took  a  fancy 
to.  The  last  name  of  this  goddess  means  "eater  of  filthy  things,"  referring,  it  is  said, 
to  her  function  of  hearing  and  pardoning  the  confessions  of  men  and  women  guilty  of 
unclean  and  carnal  crimes. — (Bancroft,  H.  H.  Native  Races  of  the  Pacific  Slope,  vol.  3, 
p.  380.) 

In  the  manuscript  explaining  the  Codex  Telleriano,  given  in  Kings- 
borough's  "Mexican  Antiquities,"  vol.  5,  p.  131,  occurs  the  name  of  the 
goddess  Ochpaniztli,  whose  feast  fell  on  the  12th  of  September  of  our 

*L'adorateur  prSsentait  devant  I'autel  son  posterior  nu,  soulageait  ses  entrailles  et  faisait  a  I'idole 
une  oflfrande  de  sa  puante  dejection.— (Dulaure,  "Des  Divinitos  Generatrices,"  Paris,  1825,  p.  76.) 

Philo  says  the  devotee  of  Baal-Peor  presented  to  the  idol  all  the  outward  orifices  of  the  body. 
Another  authority  says  that  the  worshiper  not  only  presented  all  these  to  the  idol,  but  that 
the  emanations  or  excretions  were  also  presented— tears  from  the  eyes,  wax  from  the  ears,  pus 
from  the  nose,  saliva  from  the  mouth,  and  urine  and  dejecta  from  the  lower  openings.  This  was 
the  god  to  svhich  the  Jews  joined  themselves;  and  these,  in  all  probability,  were  the  ceremonies 
they  practiced  in  his  worship.— (Robert  Allen  Campbell,  Phallic  Worship,  St.  Louis,  1888,  p.  171.) 

Still  another  authority  says  the  worshiper,  presenting  his  bare  posterior  to  the  altar,  relieved  his 
bowels,  and  oifered  the  result  to  the  idol:  "  Eo  quod  distendebant  coram  illo  foramen  podicis  et 
stercus  offerebant."- (Hargrave  Jennings,  Phallicism,  London,  1884,  quoting  Rabbi  Solomon  Jar- 
chi,  in  his  Commentary  on  Numbers  XXV.) 

These  two  citations  go  to  show  that  the  worshiper  intended  making  not  a  merely  ceremonial 
offering  of  flatulence,  but  an  actual  oblation  of  excrement,  such  as  has  been  stated,  was  placed  upon 
the  altars  of  their  near  neighbors,  the  Assyrians,  in  the  devotions  tendered  their  Venus. 

t  Ye  have  seen  dung  gods,  wood  and  stone.— (Deut.,  xxix  :  17.  See  Cruden's  Concordance  Arti- 
cles, "Dung"  and  "Dungy,"  but  no  light  is  thrown  upon  the  expression.) 

And  ye  have  seen  their  abominations  and  their  idols  (detestable  things),  wood  and  stone,  silver 
and  gold,  which  were  among  them.— (Lange's  Commentary  on  Deuteronomy,  edited  by  Dr.  Philip 
Schaff,  New  York,  1879.  But  in  foot-note  one  reads,  "Margin— dungy  gods  from  the  shape  of  the 
ordure,  literally  thin  clods  or  balls,  or  that  which  can  be  rolled  about.— A.  G.") 

JTlafolteotl,  la  deese  de  I'ordure,  ou  Tla^olquani,  la  mangeuse  d'ordure,  parcequ'elle  presidait 
aux  amours  et  aux  plaisirs  lubriques.— (Brasseur  de  Bourbourg,  introduction  to  Landa,  French 
edition,  Paris,  1864,  p.  87.) 

?  El  dios  de  los  vicios  y  suciedades  que  le  decian  Tlazulteotl.— (Mendieta,  in  Icazbalceta,  Mexico, 
1870.  vol.  1,  p.  81.) 


38  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

calendar.  She  was  described  as  ''the  one  who  sinned  by  eating  the  fruit 
of  the  tree."  The  Spanish  monks  styled  her,  as  well  as  another  goddess, 
Tlagolteotl — "La  diosa  de  basura  6  pecado."  But  "basura"  is  not 
the  alternative  of  sin  (pecado) ;  it  means  "  dung,  manure,  ordure,  excre- 
ment."* It  is  possible  that,  in  their  zeal  to  discover  analogies  between 
the  Aztec  and  Christian  religions,  the  early  missionaries  passed  over  a 
number  of  points  now  left  to  conjecture. 

In  the  same  volume  of  Kingsborough,  p.  136,  there  is  an  allusion  to 
the  offerings  or  sacrifices  made  Tepeololtec,  "  que,  en  romance,  quiere  decir 
sacrificios  de  mierda,"  which,  "in  plain  language,  signifies  sacrifices  of 
excrement."  Nothing  further  can  be  adduced  upon  the  subject,  although 
a  note  at  the  foot  of  this  page,  in  Kingsborough,  says  that  here  several 
pages  of  the  Codex  Telleriano  had  been  obliterated  or  mutilated,  probably 
by  some  over-zealous  expurgator. 

Knowing  of  the  existence  of  "  dung  gods  "  among  E,omans,  Egyptians, 
Hebrews,  and  Moabites,  it  is  not  unreasonable  to  insist,  in  the  present 
case,  upon  a  rigid  adherence  to  the  text,  and  to  assert  that,  where  it 
speaks  of  a  sacrifice  as  a  sacrifice  of  excrement  and  designates  a  deity  as 
an  eater  of  excrement,  it  means  what  it  says,  and  should  not  be  distorted, 
under  the  plea  of  symbolism,  into  a  perversion  of  facts  and  ideas. 

.     THE    USE    OF   THE    LINGAM    IN    INDIA. 

Such  a  symbolism  is  to  be  detected  in  the  use  of  the  lingam  in  the 

East  Indies,  and  it  is  a  symbolism  strikingly  adapted  to  the  intent  of 

this  article.     In  describing  the  sacrifice  called  Poojah,  Maurice  relates 

that— 

The  Abichegam  makes  a  part  of  the  Pooja.  This  ceremony  consists  in  pouring  milk 
upon  the  lingam.  This  liquor  is  afterward  kept  with  great  care,  and  some  drops  are 
given  to  dying  people  that  they  may  merit  the  delights  of  the  Calaison.f 

Again,  he  speaks  of  the  salagram,  a  stone  which  is  to  the  Vishnuite 
what  the  lingam  is  to  the  Seevites : 

Happy  are  those  favored  devotees  who  can  quaff  the  sanctified  water  in  which  either 
has  been  bathed.  % 

Dulaure  describes  the  rites  of  the  Cachi-couris,  in  which  the  sacred 
water  of  the  Ganges  is  first  poured  upon  the  lingam ;  after  flowing  upon 

*  According  to  Neumann  and  Baretti's  Velasquez,  while,  according  to  the  dictionary  of  the 
Spanish  Academy,  the  meaning  is  "the  dirt  and  dust  collected  in  sweeping— the  sweepings  and 
dung  of  stables." 

t  Maurice,  "  Indian  Antiquities,"  London,  1800,  vol.  5,  p.  179. 

tidem,  p.  146. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  39 

the  lingam,  it  is  carefully  preserved  and  dealt  out  in  drops  to  the  faith- 
ful.    It  is  of  special  service  in  soothing  the  last  hours  of  the  dying.* 

The  lingam  is  the  phallic  symbol.  The  water  or  milk  sanctified  by  it 
may  represent  a  former  employment  of  urine,  such,  as  will  soon  be  shown, 
prevailed  all  over  Europe.  This  use  of  lingam  water  is  perhaps  analo- 
gous to  that  of  mistletoe  water,  previously  noted. 

URINE   AND   ORDURE   AS   SIGNS   OF    MOURNING. 

Care  should  be  taken  to  distinguish  between  the  religious  use  of  ordure 
and  urine  and  that  in  which  they  figure  as  outward  signs  of  mourning, 
induced  by  a  frenzy  of  grief,  or  where  they  have  been  utilized  in  the  arts. 

Lord  Kingsborough  (Mexican  Antiquities,  vol,  8,  p.  237)  briefly  out- 
lines such  ritualistic  defilement  in  the  Mortuary  Ceremonies  of  Hebrews 
and  Aztecs,  giving  as  references  for  the  latter  Diego  Duran,  and  for  the 
former  the  prophet  Zechariah,  chap,  iii :  "Now  Joshua  was  clothed  with 
filthy  garments  and  stood  before  the  angel,"  &c. 

URINE   AND   ORDURE   IN    INDUSTRIES. 

By  the  Eskimo  urine  is  preserved  for  use  in  tanning  skins,t  while  its 
employment  in  the  preparation  of  leather  in  both  Europe  and  America 
is  too  well  understood  to  require  any  reference  to  authorities. 

The  Kioways  of  the  Great  Plains  soaked  their  bufialo  hides  in  urine 
to  make  them  soft  and  flexible.  | 

Bernal  Diaz,  in  his  enumeration  of  the  articles  for  sale  in  the  "  ti- 
anguez"  or  market-places  of  Tenochtitlan,  uses  this  expression : 

I  must  also  mention  human  excrements  which  were  exposed  for  sale  in  canoes  lying  in 
the  canals  near  this  square,  which  is  used  for  the  tanning  of  leather ;  for,  according  +o  the 
assurances  of  the  Mexicans,  it  is  impossible  to  tan  well  without  it. — (Bernal  Diaz,  "Con- 
quest of  Mexico,"  London,  1844,  vol.  1,  p.  236.) 

The  same  use  of  ordure  in  tanning  bear-skins  can  be  found  among  the 
nomadic  Apaches  of  Arizona,  although,  preferentially,  they  use  the  ordure 
of  the  animal  itself. 

*  Verser  quelques  gouttes  sur  la  tSte  et  dans  la  bouche  des  agonisants.— (Dulaure,  "  Des  Divini- 
tes  Generatrices,"  Paris,  1825,  pp.  105, 106,  111.) 

t  They  also  keep  urine  in  tubs  in  their  huts  for  use  in  dressing  deer  and  seal  skins.  (Hans  Egede : 
also  quoted  in  Richardson,  "  Polar  Regions,"  Edinburgh,  1861,  p.  304. )  The  same  custom  has  been 
noted  in  Alaska.  The  same  thing  mentioned  by  Egede's  grand  nephew,  Hans  Egede  Saabye, 
"  Greenland,"  London,  1816,  p.  6. 

+  The  whole  process  was  carefully  observed  by  Captain  Robert  G.  Carter,  4th  Cavalry,  U.  S.  Army. 


40  URINE  DANCES  AND  UE-OBGIES. 

Gomara,  who  also  tabulated  the  articles  sold  in  the  Mexican  markets, 

does  not  mention  ordure  in  direct  terms ;  his  words  are  more  vao;ue : 

All  these  tMngs  which  I  speak  of,  with  many  that  I  do  not  know  and  others  about  which 
I  keep  silent,  are  sold  in  this  market  of  the  Mexicans.* 

-  Urine  figures  as  the  mordant  for  fixing  the  colors  of  blankets  and  other 
woolen  fabrics  woven  by  the  Navajoes  of  New  Mexico,  by  the  Mokis  of 
Arizona,  by  the  Zunis  and  other  Pueblos  of  the  Southwest,  by  the  Arau- 
canians  of  Chile,  by  Mexicans,  Peruvians,  by  some  of  the  tribes  of  Af- 
ghanistan, and  other  nations ;  by  all  of  whom  it  is  carefully  preserved. 

In  the  interior  of  China,  travelers  relate  that  copper  receptacles  along 
the  roadsides  rescue  from  loss  a  fertilizer  whose  value  is  fully  recognized. 
.  In  Germany  and  France,  during  the  past  century,  farmers  and  gar- 
deners were  generally  careful  of  this  fertilizer. 

''In  the  valley  of  Guzco,  Peru,  and,  indeed,  in  almost  all  parts  of  the 
Sierra,  they  used  human  manure  for  the  maize  crops,  because  they  said 
it  was  the  best."  (Garcillasso  de  la  Vega,  "  Comentarios  Keales,"  Clem- 
ent C.  Markham's  Translation,  in  Hakluyt  Society,  vol.  45,  p.  11.) 

Animal  manure  was  known  as  a  fertilizer  to  the  Jews.  (2  Kings,  ix : 
37.     Jeremiah,  viii:  2;  ix:  22;  xvi:  4;  xxv:  33.) 

Human  manure  also.  (Consult  McClintock  and  Strong's  Encyclopaedia, 
article,  "Dung.") 

Urine  has  also  been  employed  as  a  detergent  in  scouring  wool.  (See 
Encyclopasdia  Britannica,  article,  "  Bleaching.") 

Diderot  and  D'Alembert  say  that  the  sal  ammoniac  of  the  ancients 
was  prepared  with  the  urine  of  camels;  that  phosphorus,  as  then  manu- 
factured in  England,  was  made  with  human  urine,  as  was  also  saltpeter. 
(Encyclopaedia,  Geneva,  1789,  article  "Urine.") 

.  Sal  ammoniac  derives  its  name  from  having  been  first  made  in  the 
vicinity  of  the  temple  of  Jupiter  Ammon ;  it  would  be  of  consequence 
to  us  to  know  whether  or  not  the  priests  of  that  temple  had  administered 
urine  in  disease  before  they  learned  how  to  extract  from  it  the  medicinal 
salt  which  has  come  down  to  our  own  times. 

The  employment  of  diff'erent  manures  as  fuel  for  firing  pottery  among 
Mokis,  Zunis,  and  other  Pueblos,  and  for  general  heating  in  Thibet,  has 
been  pointed  out  by  the  author  in  a  former  work.  (Snake  Dance  of  the 
Mokis,  London,  1884 ;  New  York,  1884.)     It  was  used  for  the  same 

*  Todo  estas  cosas  que  digo  y  muchas  que  no  se  y  otras  que  callo,  se  venden  en  este  mercado  des- 
tos  de  Mejico.— (G6mara,  "  Historia  de  la  Conquista  de  Mejico,"  p.  349.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  41 

purpose  in  Africa,  according  to  Mungo  Park.  (Travels,  &c.,  p.  119.) 
The  dung  of  the  buffalo  served  the  same  purpose  in  the  domestic  economy 
of  the  Plains  Indians,  Camel  dung  is  the  fuel  of  the  Bedouins ;  that  of 
men  and  animals  alike  was  saved  and  dried  by  the  Syrians,  Arabians, 
Egyptians,  and  people  of  West  of  England  for  fuel.  Egyptians  heated 
their  lime-kilns  with  it.  (McClintock  and  Strong,  ''Dung."  See,  also, 
Kitto's  Biblical  Encyclopaedia,  article  "Dung.") 

For  shampooing  the  hair,  it  was  the  favorite  medium  among  the 
Eskimo.* 

Sahagun  gives,  in  detail,  the  formula  of  the  preparation  applied  by  the 
Mexicans  for  the  eradication  of  dandruff : 

Cut  the  hair  close  to  root,  wash  head  well  with  urine,  and  afterward  take  amole  (soap- 
weed)  and  coixochitl  leaves — the  amole  is  the  wormwood  of  this  country  [in  this  Saha- 
gun is  mistaken] — and  then  the  kernels  of  aguacate  ground  up  and  mixed  with  the  ashes 
already  spoken  of  (wood  ashes  from  the  fire-place),  and  then  rub  on  black  mud  with  a 
quantity  of  the  bark  mentioned  [mesquitej.f 

A  similar  method  of  dressing  the  hair,  but  without  urine,  prevails 
among  the  Indians  along  the  Pao  Colorado  and  in  Sonora,  Mexico.  First, 
an  application  is  made  of  a  mixture  of  river  mud  ("blue  mud,"  as  it  is 
called  in  Arizona)  and  pounded  mesquite  bark.  After  three  days  this  is 
removed,  and  the  hair  thoroughly  washed  with  water  in  which  the 
saponaceous  roots  of  the  the  amole  have  been  steeped.  The  hair  is  dved 
a  rich  blue-black,  and  remains  soft,  smooth,  and  glossy. 

In  the  examples  just  given,  as  well  as  in  a  few  to  follow,  where  urine 
is  applied  in  bodily  ablutions,  the  object  sought  is  undoubtedly  the  pro- 
curing of  ammonia  by  oxidation  ;  to  none  of  these  can  any  association  of 
religious  ideas  be  ascribed.  Such  will  not  be  the  case,  however,  where 
the  ablutions  are  attended  with  ceremonial  observances,  are  incorporated 
in  a  ritual,  or  take  place  in  chambers  reserved  for  sacred  purjjoses. 
No  difficulty  is  experienced  in  assigning  to  their  proper  categories  the 
urinal  ablutions  of  the  Eskimo  of  Greenland,!  of  Alaska,§  of  the  north- 
west coast  of  America,  1 1  of  the  Indians  of  Cape  Flattery,  t  of  the  people 

*SeeGraah,  "Greenland,"  London,  1837,  p. Ill,  and  Hans  Egede  Saabye,  "Greenland,"  London. 
1818,  p.  256. 

+  Contra  la  caspa  serl  necesario  cortar  muy  .1  raiz  los  cabellos  y  lavarse  la  cabeza  con  orines  y 
despues  tomar  las  hojas  de  cicrtas  yerbas  que  en  indio  se  llaman  coioxochitl  y  amolli  6  iztahuati 
que  es  el  agenjo  de  esta  tierra,  y  con  el  cuesco  del  aguacate  molido  y  mezclado  eon  el  cisco  que 
estii  dicho  arriba ;  y  sobre  esto  se  ha  de  poner,  el  barro  negro  que  estd  referido,  con  cantidad  de  la 
corteza  de  lo  dicho.— (Sahagun,  in  Kingsborough,  vol.  7,  p.  294.) 

I  Hans  Egede  Saabye,  p.  256. 

?Sabytchew's  Travels,  in  Phillips'  Voyages,  vol.  6,  London,  1807. 

II  Whymper's  Alaska,  London,  1868,  p.  142.  Bancroft.  H.  H.  Native  Races  Pacific  Slope,  vol.  1 
p.  83. 

^Swan,  in  Smithsonian  Contributions,  1869,  No.  220. 


42  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

of  Iceland,*  and  of  the  savages  of  Lower  California,t  or  of  the  Celti- 
berii  of  Spain. 

Although  they  boasted  of  cleanliness,  both  in  their  nourishment  and  in  their  dress,  it 
was  not  unusual  for  them  to  wash  their  teeth  and  bodies  in  urine — a  custom  which  they 
considered  favorable  to  health. — (Maltebrun,  Universal  Geography,  article,  "Spain," 
vol.  5,  book  137,  p.  357,  American  edition,  Philadelphia,  1832.) 

This  usage  has  been  transmitted  with  some  modification  to  the  peas- 
antry of  Portugal,  who  are,  partially  at  least,  Celtiberian  in  blood.  In 
some  sections  of  Portugal,  as  is  shown  by  Ivan  Petroff,  they  w^ash  their 
clothes  in  urine.  % 

URINE   IN   CEREMONIAL    OBSERVANCES. 

But  in  the  examples  adduced  from  Whymper  concerning  the  people  of 
the  village  of  Unlacheet,  on  Norton  Sound,  "the  dancers  of  the  Male- 
mutes  of  Norton  Sound  bathed  themselves  in  urine."  §  Although,  on 
another  page,  Whymper  says  that  this  was  for  want  of  soap,  doubt  may, 
with  some  reason,  be  entertained.  Bathing  is  a  frequent  accompaniment, 
an  integral  part  of  the  religious  ceremonial  among  all  the  Indians  of 
America,  and  no  doubt  among  the  Inuit  or  Eskimo  as  well ;  when  this 
is  performed  by  dancers,  there  is  further  reason  to  examine  carefully  for 
a  religious  complication,  and  especially  if  these  dances  be  celebrated  in 
sacred  places,  as  Petroff  relates  they  are. 

They  never  bathe  or  wash  their  bodies,  but  on  certain  occasions  the  men  light  a  fire  in 
the  kashima,  strip  themselves,  and  dance  and  jump  around  until  in  a  profuse  perspira- 
tion. They  then  apply  urine  to  their  oily  bodies  and  rub  themselves  until  a  lather  ap- 
pears, after  which  they  plunge  into  the  river.  || 

In  each  village  of  the  Kuskutchewak  (of  Alaska)  there  is  a  public  building  named  the 
kashim,  in  which  councils  are  held  and  festivals  kept,  and  which  must  be  large  enough 

*"  People  of  Iceland  were  reported  to  wash  their  hands  and  their  faces  in  pisse."  (Hakluyt, 
Voyages,  vol.  1,  p.  664.)  This  report,  however,  was  indignantly  denied  of  all  but  the  common 
people,  by  Arugrianus  Jonas,  an  Icelandic  writer. 

tPericuis  of  Lower  California,  "Mothers,  to  protect  them  against  the  weather,  cover  the  entire 
bodies  of  their  children  with  a  varnish  of  coal  and  urine."— (Bancroft,  idem,  vol.  1,  p.  559.) 

Clavigero  not  only  tells  all  that  Bancroft  does,  but  he  adds  that  the  women  of  California  washed 
their  own  faces  in  urine.— (Historia  de  Baja  California,  Mexico,  1852,  p.  28.) 

J  Ivan  Petroflf  in  "  Transactions  American  Anthropological  Society,"  vol.  1, 1882. 

Clavigero  quotes  Diodorus  Siculus  to  the  effect  that  the  Celtiberians  bathed  in  urine  and 
cleaned  their  teeth  with  it.  "  Urina  totum  corpus  perluunt,  adeoque  dentes  etiam  fricant."— (Diod. 
Siculus,  lib.  5,  in  Clavigero,  Historia  de  Baja  California,  Mexico,  1852,  p.  28.) 

Diderot  and  D'Alembert  assert  unequivocally  that  in  the  later  years  of  the  last  century  the 
people  of  the  Spanish  Peninsula  still  used  urine  as  a  dentifrice. 

Les  Espiignols  font  grand  usage  de  I'urine  pour  se  nettoyer  les  dents.  Les  anciens  Celtiberiens 
aisoient  la  meme  chose. — (Encyclopaedia,  Geneva,  1789,  article  "  Urine.") 

§Whymper'8  "Alaska,"  London.  1868.  pp.  142, 152. 

11  Ivan  Petroff  in  "Transactions  American  Anthropological  Society,"  vol.  1, 1882. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-OBGIES.  43 

to  contain  all  the  grown  men  of  the  village.  It  has  raised  platforms  around  the  walls 
and  a  place  in  the  center  for  a  fire,  with  an  aperture  in  the  roof  for  the  admission  of 
light. — (Richardson,  Arctic  Searching  Expedition,  London,  1851,  p.  365.) 

These  kasliima  are  identical  with  the  estufas  of  Zunis,  Moquis,  and 
Rio  Grande  Pueblos.     Whymper  himself  describes  them  thus  : 

These  buildings  may  be  regarded  as  the  natives'  town  hall ;  orations  are  made,  festivals 
and  feasts  are  held  in  them. 

No  room  is  left  for  doubt  after  reading  the  fuller  description  of  these 
Kashima;  contained  in  Bancroft.  He  says  that  the  Eskimo  dance  in 
them,  ''often  in  puris  naturalibus,"  and  make  "burlesque  imitations  of 
birds  and  beasts."  Dog  or  wolf  tails  hang  to  the  rear  of  their  garments. 
A  sacred  feast  of  fish  and  berries  accompanies  these  dances,  wherein  the 
actors  ''elevate  the  provisions  successively  to  the  four  cardinal  points 
and  once  to  the  skies  above,  when  all  partake  of  the  feast."* 

OEDURE    IN   SMOKING. 

Among  all  the  observances  of  the  every-day  life  of  the  American 
aborigines,  none  is  so  distinctly  complicated  with  the  religious  idea  as 
smoking;  therefore,  should  the  use  of  excrement,  human  or  animal,  be 
detected  in  this  connection,  full  play  should  be  given  to  the  suspicion 
that  a  hidden  meaning  attaches  to  the  ceremony.  This  would  appear  to 
be  the  view  entertained  by  the  indefatigable  missionary,  De  Smet,  who 
records  such  a  custom  among  the  Flatheads  and  Crows  in  1846  : 

To  render  the  odor  of  the  pacific  incense  agreeable  to  their  gods  it  is  necessary  that 
the  tobacco  and  the  herb  (skwiltz),  the  usual  ingredients,  should  be  mixed  with  a  small 
quantity  of  buffalo  dung.f 

The  Sioux,  Cheyennes,  Arapahoes,  and  others  of  the  plains  tribes,  to 
whom  the  bufialo  is  a  god,  have  the  same  or  an  almost  similar  custom. 

♦Bancroft,  H.  H.  Native  Races  Pacific  Slope,  vol.  1,  p.  75. 

t Father  De  Smet,  "Oregon  Missions,"  New  York,  1847,  p.  383. 

The  Peruvians  had  one  class  of  "wizards"  (*'•  e.,  medicine  men),  who  "told  fortunes  by  maize 
and  the  dung  of  sheep."  (Fables  and  Rites  of  the  Yncas,  Padre  Cristoval  de  Molina,  translated 
by  Clement  C.  Markham,  Hakluyt  Society  Transactions,  London,  1873,  vol.  48,  p.  14.)  Molina 
resided  in  Cuzco,  as  a  missionary,  from  1570  to  1584. 

Lus  Haohus  (a  division  of  the  Peruvian  priesthood),  consultaicnt  Tiivcnir  au  moycn  de  grains  de 
muis  ou  des  excrements  des  animaux.— (Balboa,  Ilistoire  do  Perou,  p.  29,  in  Ternaux,  vol.  15.) 

See,  also,  D.  G.  Brinton's  "  Myths  of  the  New  World,"  New  York,  1868,  pp.  278,  279. 

Dueange,  enumerating  the  pagan  superstitions  which  still  survived  in  Europe  in  A.  D.  743,  men- 
tions divination  or  augury  by  the  dung  of  horses,  cattle,  or  birds. 

Del  auguriis  vel  avium,  vel  equorum,  vel  bourn  stcrcoracibus.  — (Dueange,  Glossary,  :irticlf 
"  Stercoraces.") 


44  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

ORDURE    AND    URINE    IN    MEDICINE. 

The  administration  of  urine  as  a  curative  opens  the  door  to  a  flood  of 
thought.  Medicine,  both  in  theory  and  practice,  even  among  nations  of 
the  highest  development  and  refinement,  has  not,  until  within  the  present 
century,  cleared  its  skirts  of  the  superstitious  hand-prints  of  the  dark 
ages.  With  tribes  of  a  lower  degree  of  culture  it  is  still  subordinate  to 
the  incantations  and  exorcisms  of  the  ''medicine  man."  It  might  not 
be  going  a  step  too  far  to  assert  that  the  science  of  therapeutics,  pure 
and  simple,  has  not  yet  taken  form  among  savages ;  but  to  shorten  dis- 
cussion and  avoid  controversy,  it  will  be  assumed  here  that  such  a 
science  does  exist,  but  in  an  extremely  rude  and  embryotic  state;  and  to 
this  can  be  referred  all  examples  of  the  introduction  of  urine  or  ordure 
in  the  materia  medica,  where  the  aid  of  the  "medicine  man"  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  invoked,  as  in  the  method  employed  for  the  eradica- 
tion of  dandruff  by  Mexicans,  Eskimo,  and  others,  the  Celtiberian  den- 
trifice,  &c.* 

The  Indians  of  California  gave  urine  to  newly-born  children.  "At  time 
of  childbirth  many  singular  observances  obtained ;  for  instance,  the  old 
women  washed  the  child  as  soon  as  it  was  born  and  drank  of  the  water ; 
the  unhappy  infant  was  forced  to  take  a  draught  of  urine,  medicinally,  "f 

So  in  Peru,  "when  sucking  infants  were  taken  ill,  especially  if  their 
ailment  was  of  a  feverish  nature,  they  washed  them  in  urine  in  the  morn- 
ings, and  when  they  could  get  some  of  the  urine  of  the  child  they  gave 
it  a  drink."! 

Ignorant  people  in  both  Europe  and  America  have  been  accused  of 
nearly  identical  vagaries  in  domestic  medicine. 

Along  the  Isthmus  of  Darien  the  belief  was  prevalent  among  the 
aborigines  that  the  most  elficacious  remedy  for  poisoned  arrows  was  that 
which  required  the  wounded  man  to  swallow  pills  of  his  own  excrement. § 

Padre  Inamma,  whose  interesting  researches  upon  rattlesnake  bites 
and  their  remedies  (made  in  Lower  California,  some  time  before  the  ex- 

*Mungo  Park  states  that  he  saw  it  applied  as  a  poultice  for  suppurating  abscesses  among  Man- 
aingoes.  (Travels  in  Africa,  New  York,  &e.,  p.  203.)  The  author  has  seen  it  plastered  upon  bee- 
stings, with  a  soothing  eflfect,  in  New  Jersey. 

+  Bancroft,  H.  H.  Native  Races,  vol.  1,  p.  413. 

t  Gareilnsso  de  la  Vega,  Comentarios  Reales,  Markham's  Translation,  Hakluyt  Society,  vol.  -il, 

p.  m. 

?  Decian  que  era  el  antidoto  de  esta  pon^ona  el  Fuego  i  el  agua  del  mar.  la  dieta  y  continencia. 
Y  otra  dicen  que  la  hez  del  herido  tomada  en  pildoras  o  en  otra  forma.  (Ilerrera,  Decades,  2, 
lib.  1,  pp.  3,  9, 10.)  They  used  to  say  that  the  antidotes  for  this  poison  were  fire,  sea-water,  ftisting, 
and  continence.  Another  of  which  they  speak  was  the  excrement  of  the  wounded  man  taken  in 
form  of  pill  or  otherwise. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UB- ORGIES.  45 

pulsion  of  the  Jesuits,  in  1767)  are  published  in  Clavigero,*  says  that 
the  most  usual  and  most  efficacious  antidote  was  human  ordure,  fresh 
and  dissolved  in  water,  drunk  by  the  person  bitten. 

Analogous  medicaments  may  be  hinted  at  in  Smith's  account  of  the 
Aracuanians  of  Chile: 

Their  remedies  are  principally,  if  not  entirely,  vegetable  matter,  though  they  admin- 
ister many  disgusting  compounds  of  animal  matter,  which  they  pretend  are  endowed  with 
miraculous  powers. — (Smith,  Araucanians,  New  York,  1855,  p.  234.) 

Brand  enumerates  obsolete  recipes,  one  of  which  (disease  not  men- 
tioned) directed  the  patient  to  take  "  five  spoonfuls  of  knave  child  urine 
of  an  innocent."  t 

The  Siberians  gave  human  urine  to  their  reindeer: 

Nothing  is  so  acceptable  to  a  reindeer  as  human  urine,  and  I  have  even  seen  them  run 
to  get  it  as  occasion  offered. — (John  Dundas  Cochrane,  Pedestrian  Journey  Through 
Siberian  Tartary,  1820-23,-  Philadelphia,  1824,  p.  235.) 

Here  the  intent  was  evident ;  the  animals  needed  salt,  and  no  other 
method  of  obtaining  it  was  feasible  during  the  winter  months.  Cochrane 
is  speaking  of  the  Tchuktchi,  but  he  was  also  among  Yakuts  and  other 
tribes.  He  walked  from  Saint  Petersburgh  to  Kamtschatka  and  from 
point  to  point  in  Siberia  for  a  total  distance  of  over  six  thousand  miles. 
His  pages  are  dark  with  censure  of  the  filthy  and  disgusting  habits  of 
the  savage  nomads,  as,  of  the  Yakuts,  ''their  stench  and  filth  are  incon- 
ceivable." "The  large  tents  (of  the  Tchuktchi)  were  disgustingly  dirty 
and  offensive,  exhibiting  every  species  of  grossness  and  indelicacy."  In- 
side the  tents  men,  women,  and  girls  were  absolutely  naked.  "They 
drink  only  snow-water  during  the  winter,  to  melt  which,  when  no  wood 
can  be  had,  very  disgusting  and  dirty  means  are  resorted  to,"  &c.  .  But 
nowhere  does  he  speak  of  the  drinking  of  human  urine,  which,  as  has 
been  learned  from  other  sources,  does  obtain  among  them. 

Thus  far,  the  citations  have  not  specifically  mentioned  the  association 
of  occult  influence  with  human  excreta,  but  those  to  follow  impute, 
without  vagueness  or  ambiguity,  a  mysterious  and  inexplicable  potency 
to  both  urine  and  ordure. 

*  El  remedio  mas  usual  y  eficaz  es  el  de  la  triaca  humana.  asi  llamada,  para  mayor  deccncia.  el 
escremento  humane,  fresco  y  disuelto  en  aqua  que  haeen  beber  al  mordido.— (Clavigero,  llistoria 
de  la  Bnja  California,  Mexico,  1852.) 

t  Brand,  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  3,  p.  282. 


46  URINE  DANCES  AND  UB- ORGIES. 

OCCULT   INFLUENCES   ASCKIBED    TO    ORDURE   AND   URINE. 

In  Canada,  human  urine  was  drunk  as  a  medicine.  Father  Sagard 
witnessed  a  dance  of  the  Hurons  in  which  the  young  men,  women,  and 
girls  danced  naked  around  a  sick  woman,  into  whose  mouth  one  of  the 
young  men  urinated,  she  swallowing  the  disgusting  draught  in  the  hope 
of  being  cured.* 

By  the  French,  it  was  considered  a  certain  cure  for  fever.  Such  an 
amount  of  superstition  attached  to  the  panacea  that  the  prescription  may 
well  be  given  in  full : 

Knead  a  small  loaf  with  urine  voided  in  the  worst  stage  of  his  fever  by  a  person  hav- 
ing the  quaternary  ague.  Bake  the  loaf,  let  it  cool,  and  give  it  to  be  eaten  by  another 
person.  Repeat  the  same  during  three  different  attacks,  and  the  fever  will  leave  the 
patient  and  go  to  the  person  who  has  eaten  the  bread. 

Another  one  runs  in  these  terms : 

Take  an  egg,  boil  it  hard,  and  break  off  the  shell.  Prick  the  egg  in  different  places 
with  a  needle,  steep  it  in  the  urine  of  a  person  afflicted  with  fever,  and  then  give  it  to  a 
man  (if  the  patient  be  a  man),  to  a  woman  (if  a  woman),  and  the  recipient  will  acquire  the 
fever,  which  will  abandon  the  patient,  t 

This  remedy  Thiers  traces  back  to  the  Komans,  quoting  from  Horace 
in  support  of  his  assertion. 

The  second  recipe  finds  its  parallel  in  the  "  Chinook  olives,"  described 
in  the  first  pages  of  this  monograph. 

English  women,  in  some  localities,  drank  the  urine  of  their  husbands 
to  assist  them  in  the  hour  of  labor.  J 


* II  se  fit  un  jour  une  dance  de  tous  les  jeunes  hommes,  femmes  et  filles  toutes  nues,  eu  la  presence 
d'une  malade,  a  la  quelle  il  fallut  (traict  que  je  ne  SQay  commen  excuser  ou  passer  sous  silence), 
qu'un  de  ees  jeunes  hommes  luy  pissast  dans  la  bouche  et  qu'elle  auallast  et  beust  cette  eau,  ce 
qu'ellc  fit  avec  un  grand  courage,  esperant  en  receuoir  guerison.— (Sagard,  Histoire  du  Canada, 
edition  of  Paris,  1885,  p.  107.) 

tPotrir  un  petit  pain  avec  I'urine  qu'une  personne  malade  de  la  fievre  quarte  aura  rendue  dans 
lefortdesonaeces,  lefairecuire,  lelaisserfroidir,  ledonner^mangeraun  *  *  *  et  faire  trois 
fois  la  meme  chose  pendant  troisaeces,le  *  *  *  prendra  la  figvre  quarte  et  ellequittera  la  per- 
sonne malade. 

Faire  durcir  un  oeuf,  le  peler,  le  piquer  de  divers  coups  d'aiguille,  le  tremper  dans  I'urine  d'une 
personne  qui  a  la  fievre  *  *  *  puis  le  donner  a  un  *  *  *  si  le  malade  est  un  male  ou  a  une 
*  *  *  si  le  malade  est  une  femelle  et  la  fievre  s'en  ira.— (Thiers,  Traite  des  Superstitions,  Paris, 
1745,  vol.  1,  lib.  5.  cap.  4,  p.  386.  Copied  in  Picart,  Coiitumes  et  Ceremonies,  &c.,  Amsterdam,  1729, 
vol.  10,  p.  80.) 

t"  In  the  collection  entitled  Sylon,  or  the  Wood,  p.  130,  we  read  that '  a  few  years  ago,  in  this  same 
village,  the  women  in  labor  used  to  drinke  the  urine  of  their  husbands,  who  were  all  the  while 
stationed,  as  I  have  seen  the  cows  in  St.  James'  Park,  straining  themselves  to  give  as  much  as  they 
can.'  "—(Brand,  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  3,  article,  "  Lady  in  the  Straw.") 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  47 

By  the  Irish  peasantry,  it  was  sprinkled  upon  sick  children.* 
American  boys  urinate  upon  their  legs  to  prevent  cramp  while  swim- 
ming. 

By  the  Hottentot  priests,  it  is  said  to  have  been  sprinkled  upon  newly- 
married  couples,  t 

FEARFUL   RITE   OF   THE   HOTTENTOTS. 

A  religious  rite  of  still  more  fearful  import  occurs  among  the  same 
people  at  the  initiation  of  their  young  men  into  the  rank  of  warriors — a 
ceremony  which  must  be  deferred  until  the  postulant  has  attained  his 
eighth  or  ninth  year.  It  consists,  principally,  in  depriving  him  of  the 
left  testicle,  after  which  the  medicine  man  voids  his  urine  upon  him.  | 

With  equal  solicitude  does  the  Hottentot  medicine  man  follow  the  re- 
mains of  his  kinsmen  to  the  grave,  aspersing  with  the  same  sacred  liquid 
the  corpse  of  the  dead  and  the  persons  of  the  mourners  who  bewail  his 
loss.§ 

The  French  attributed  to  it  other  virtues  beyond  its  efficacy  as  a  feb- 
rifuge. 

URINE    USED   TO    DEFEAT   WITCHCRAFT. 

It  was  in  requisition  to  ward  off  the  machinations  of  witches.  In  the 
valuable  compilation  of  superstitious  practices  interdicted  by  Koman 
Catholic  councils  Thiers  includes  the  persons  who  bathe  their  hands  with 
urine  in  the  morning  to  avert  witchcraft  or  nullify  its  effect.     He  says, 

*  Brand  quotes  Camden,  as  relating  of  the  Irish,  that  "if  a  child  is  at  any  time  out  of  order,  they 
sprinkle  it  with  the  stalest  urine  they  can  get."— (Brand,  Popular  Antiquities,  article  "  Christen- 
ing Customs,"  London,  1849,  vol.  2,  p.  86.) 

After  the  first  portion  of  this  monograph  had  gone  to  press,  the  author  was  fortunate  in  obtain- 
ing a  copy  of  the  recently  published  address  of  Mr.  James  Mooney,  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology, 
Washington,  D.  C,  upon  the  "  Medical  Mythology  of  Ireland." 

This  interesting  and  extremely  valuable  contribution,  which  can  be  found  in  the  Transactions 
of  the  American  Philosophical  Society  for  1887,  leaves  no  uncertainty  in  regard  to  the  mystic 
powers  ascribed  by  the  Celtic  peasantry  to  both  urine  and  ordure.  Urine  and  chicken  dung  are 
shown  to  be  potent  in  frustrating  the  mischief  of  fairies;  "fire,  iron,  and  dung"  are  spoken  of  as 
the  "  three  great  safeguards  against  the  influence  of  fairies  and  the  infernal  spirits."  Dung  is 
carried  about  the  person,  as  part  of  the  contents  of  amulets ;  and  children  suffering  from  convul- 
sions are,  as  a  last  resort,  bathed  from  head  to  foot  in  urine,  to  rescue  them  from  the  clutches  of 
their  fairy  persecutors. 

t  Mungo  Park's  Travels  in  Africa,  New  York,  1813,  p.  109;  also  previous  citation. 
J  See  in  Picart,  Cofltumes  et  C<?r6monies  Religieuses,  etc..  Religion  des  Africains,  Amsterdam, 
1729,  vol.  7.  p.  47.) 

§  Picart,  Cofltumes  et  C6r6monies  R61igieuses,  etc.,  Amsterdam,  1729,  vol.  7,  pp.  52,  57. 


48  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

too,  that  Saint  Lucy  was  reputed  to  be  a  witch,  for  which  reason  the 
Roman  judge,  Paschasius,  at  her  trial  sprinkled  her  with  urine.* 

There  is  on  record  the  confession  of  a  young  French  witch,  Jeanne 
Bosdean,  at  Bordeaux,  1594,  wherein  is  described  a  witches'  mass,  at 
which  the  devil  appeared  in  the  disguise  of  a  black  buck,  with  a  candle 
between  his  horns.  When  holy  water  was  needed,  the  buck  urinated  in 
a  hole  in  the  ground,  and  the  officiating  witch  aspersed  it  upon  the  con- 
gregation with  a  black  sprinkler.  Jeanne  Bosdean  adhered  to  her  story 
even  when  in  the  flames. f 

Leaving  the  continent  and  crossing  the  channel,  the  same  queer  usages, 
based  upon  the  same  ideas,  are  to  be  discovered.  In  England  "  it  was  a 
supposed  remedy  against  witchcraft  to.  put  some  of  the  bewitched  per- 
son's water,  with  a  quantity  of  pins,  needles,  and  nails,  into  a  bottle, 
cork  them  up,  and  set  them  before  the  fire,  in  order  to  confine  the  spirit.  "| 

At  the  trials  of  witches  one  of  the  usual  tests  was  "the  burning  of 
the  dung  or  urine  of  such  as  are  bewitched."  J 

-  For  the  detection  of  witches,  "  a  handful  of  thatch  from  over  the  door, 
or  a  tile,  if  it  be  tiled,"  was  taken  from  the  suspected  witch's  house;  i'  if 
it  be  thatch,  you  must  wet  and  sprinkle  it  over  with  the  patient's  water, 
and  likewise  with  salt."  % 

There  are  several  tests  and  remedies  of  the  same  general  nature.  It 
is  believed  that  the  foregoing  will  suffice.  Brand  says  that  the  one  last 
given  was  in  vogue  in  Somersetshire  as  late  as  1730. 

"  Pennant  tells  us  that  the  Highlanders  on  New  Year's  Day  burn  juni- 
per before  their  cattle,  and  on  the  first  Monday  in  every  quarter  sprinkle 
them  with  urine.  § 

"Casting  urine"  is  mentioned  among  the  list  of  "superstitious  prac- 
tices preserved  in  the  life  and  character  of  Harvey,  the  famous  conjurer 
of  Dubhn,  1728."  || 

*  Ceux  qui  lavent  leurs  mains  le  matin  avec  de  I'urine  pour  detourner  les  malcfices  ou  pour  en 
empeeher  I'eifet.  C'est  pour  cela  que  le  juge  Paschase  fit  arroser  d'urine  Sainte  Luce,  parce  qu'il 
s'imaginoit  qu'eUe  etoit  sorciere.— (Thiers,  Traite  des  Superstitions,  Paris,  1741,  vol.  1,  cap.  5,  p. 
171.) 

This  statement  is  repeated  verbatim  by  Picart  (Cofltumes  et  Ceremonies,  etc.,  Amsterdam,  1729, 
vol.  10,  p.  35),  and  he  adds,  that  the  judge  believed  that  he  would  by  this  precaution  disable  her 
from  evading  the  torments  in  store  for  her.  John  of  Saulsbury,  bishop  of  Chartres,  with  good 
reason  east  ridicule  upon  this  charm. 

t  Pour  faire  dc  I'eau  fenite,  le  Bouc  pissoit  dans  un  trou  a  terre  et  celui  qui  faisoit  I'office  en 
arrosoit  les  assistans  avec  un  asperge  noir.— (Thiers,  Superstitions,  etc.,  vol.  2,  book  4,  cap.  1,  p. 
367.    See  the  same  story  in  Picart,  vol.  8,  p.  69.) 

t  Brand's  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  3,  pp.  13,  24,  25,  35. 

?Brand,  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  1.  p.  13. 

I  Brand,  vol.  3,  p.  170. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UE- ORGIES.  49 

"Ostanes,  the  magician,  prescribed  the  dipping  of  our  feet,  in  the 
morning,  in  human  urine  as  a  preventative  against  charms."* 

The  malevolence  of  witchcraft  seems  to  have  taken  its  greatest  pleasure 
in  subtle  assaults  upon  those  just  entering  the  married  state.  Fortunately, 
amulets,  talismans,  and  counter  charms  were  within  reach  of  all  who 
needed  them ;  one  of  those  only  will  be  given — urination  through  the 
wedding  ring,  f 

The  Eomans  had  a  feast  to  the  mother  of  all  the  gods,  Berecinthia,  in 
which  the  matrons  took  her  idol  and  sprinkled  it  with  their  urine.  % 

Berecinthia  was  one  of  the  names  under  which  Gybele  or  Khea,  the 
primal  earth  goddess,  was  worshiped  by  the  Romans  and  by  many  nations 
in  the  East.  Her  priests,  the  Galli,  emasculated  themselves  in  orgies 
whose  frenzy  was  of  the  same  general  type  as  the  Omophagi  of  the  Greeks, 
previously  described. 

It  is  strange  to  encounter  in  races  so  diverse  apparently  as  the  Greeks 
and  the  Hottentots  the  same  rites  of  emasculation  and  urine  sprinkling. 
Father  Le  Jeune  must  have  been  on  the  track  of  something  corre- 
sponding to  an  ur-orgie  among  the  Hurons  when  he  learned  that  the 
devil  imposed  upon  the  sick,  in  dreams,  the  duty  of  wallowing  in  ordure 
if  they  hoped  for  restoration  to  health.  § 

The  following  is  described  as  the  Abyssinian  method  of  exorcising  a 
woman:  The  exorcist  ''lays  an  amulet  on  the  patient's  heaving  bosom, 
makes  her  smell  of  some  vile  compound,  and  the  moment  her  madness  is 
somewhat  abated  begins  a  dialogue  with  the  Bouda  (demon),  who  answers 
in  a  woman's  voice.  The  devil  is  invited  to  come  out  in  the  name  of  all 
the  saints,  but  a  threat  to  treat  him  with  some  red  hot  coals  is  usually 
more  potent,  and  after  he  has  promised  to  obey,  he  seeks  to  delay  his 
exit  by  asking  for  something  to  eat.  Filth  and  dirt  are  mixed  and  hid- 
den under  a  bush,  when  the  woman  crawls  to  the  sickening  repast  and 
gulps  it  down  with  avidity."  (From  an  article  entitled  "Abyssinian 
Women,"  in  the  ''Evening  Star,"  Washington,  D.  C.,  October  17,  1885.) 

ORDURE   IN   LOVE-PHILTERS. 

Love-sick  maidens  in  France  stand  accused  of  making  as  a  philter  a 
cake,  into  whose  composition  entered  "nameless  ingredients,"  which  con- 

*  Brand,  vol.3,  p.  2S6. 

t    *    *    *    through  the  wedding  ring.— (Brand,  vol.  3,  p.  305.) 

JLa  rociaba  con  sus  orines.— (Torquemada,  Monarchia  Indiana,  lib.  x,  chap,  xxiii.) 

2Leur  faisant  voir  en  songe,  qu'ils  ne  sfauroient  guerir  qu'en  se  veautant  dans  toutes  sortes 

d'ordures.— (Pere  Le  Jeune,  Jesuit  Relations,  1636.    Published  by  Canadian  Government,  Quebec. 

1858.) 


50  URINE  DANCES  AND  UB-ORGIES. 

fection  being  eaten  by  the  refractory  lover,  soon  caused  a  revival  of  his 
waning  affections.*  This  was  considered  to  savor  so  strongly  of  witch- 
craft that  it  was  interdicted  by  councils. 

The  witches  and  wizards  of  the  Apache  tribe  make  a  confection  or 
philter  one  of  the  ingredients  of  which  is  generally  human  ordure,  as 
the  author  learned  from  some  of  them  a  few  years  since.  The  Navajoes, 
of  same  blood  and  language  as  the  Apaches,  employ  the  dung  of  cows 
(as  related  in  the  ''  Snake  Dance  of  the  Mokis,"  p.  75). 

This  recapitulation  of  urinal  aspersions,  ablutions,  &c.,  is  sufficient  to 
expose  the  very  widespread  dissemination  of  the  rite,  which  in  the  case 
of  the  European  races  at  least  may  be  referred  to  an  origin  in  India  in 
the  earliest  ages  of  the  human  family.  The  resemblances  cannot  safely  be 
explained  away  as  accidental ;  the  Aryan  tribes,  in  their  migrations  from 
the  far  East,  took  with  them  languages,  reUgious  rites  and  ceremonies,  and 
social  usages  whose  counterpart,  slightly  altered  or  distorted  perhaps  in 
transmission,  may  be  stumbled  upon  among  distantly  related  brethren  in 
the  former  habitat. 

The  love-philter  described  in  the  preceding  paragraph  recalls  a  some- 
what analogous  practice  among  the  Manicheans,  whose  eucharistic  bread 
was  incorporated  or  sprinkled  with  human  semen,  possibly  with  the 
idea  that  the  bread  of  life  should  be  strengthened  by  the  life-giving  ex- 
cretion.f 

The  Albigenses,  or  Catharistes,  their  descendants,  are  alleged  to  have 
degenerated  into  or  to  have  preserved  the  same  vile  superstition. J 

Understanding  that  these  allegations  proceed  from  hostile  sources, 
their  insertion  in  this  category  has  been  permitted  only  upon  the  theory 
that  as  the  Manichean  ethics  and  ritual  present  resemblances  to  both  the 

*"  Le  malefice  amoureux  ou  le  philtre  "  is  defined  as  follows :  "  Telle  est  la  pratique  de  certaines 
femmes  et  de  certaines  filles  qui,  pour  obliger  leurs  galans  *  *  *  de  les  aimer  comme  auparavaut 
*  *  *  les  font  manger  du  gateau  oil  elles  ont  mis  des  ordures  que  je  ne  veux  pas  nommcr."— 
(.Jean  Baptiste  Thiers,  Traite  des  Superstitions,"  Paris,  1741,  p.  150.) 

tQu§,  occasione  vel  potius  execrabilis  superstitionis  quadam  necessitate  coguntur  electi  eorum 
velut  eucharistiam  conspersam  cum  semine  huraano  sumere. — (Saint  Augustine,  quoted  by  Bayle, 
Philosophical  Dictionary,  English  edition,  London.  1737,  article  "Manicheans.") 

+  Les  Catharistes  qui  etoient  une  espece  choisis  de  Manicheens,  pdtrissoient  le  pain  Eucharistique 
avec  la  semence  humaine.— (Thiers,  Superstitions,  Ac,  Paris,  1741,  vol.  2,  lib.  2,  chap.  1,  p.  216; 
and  Pieart,  Contflmes  et  Ceremonies,  Ac,  Amsterdam,  1729,  vol.  8,  p.  79.) 

E.  B.  Tylor  says  that  "about  A.  D.  7(X)  John  of  Osun,  patriarch  of  Armenia,  wrote  a  diatribe 
against  the  sect  of  Paulicians"  (who  were  believed  to  be  the  descendants  of  the  Manicheans,  and 
in  turn  to  have  transmitted  their  doctrines  to  the  Albigenses).  In  the  course  of  the  diatribe  the 
patriarch  declares  that  "they  mix  wheaten  flour  with  the  blood  of  infants  and  therewith  cele- 
brate their  communion."— (E.  B.  Tylor,  Primitive  Culture,  London,  1871,  vol.  1,  p.  69.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  51 

Parsee  and  Buddhist  religions  (from  which  they  may  to  some  extent  have 
originated),  there  is  reason  for  supposing  that  ritualistic  ablutions,  asper- 
sions, and  other  practices  analogous  to  those  of  the  great  sect  farther  to 
the  East,  may  have  been  transmitted  to  the  younger  religion  in  Europe.* 

BURLESQUE   SURVIVALS. 

A  new  task  now  presents  itself — the  examination  into  burlesque  sur- 
vivals of  rites  and  usages  no  longer  countenanced  as  matters  of  religious 
importance. 

The  Hindu  festival  of  Holi,  Hull,  or  Hulica,  familiar  to  most  readers, 
has  thus  been  outlined  by  a  recent  witness  as  celebrated  in  the  provinces 
near  Oudeypore.f  The  proceedings  are  characterized  as  a  saturnalia,  at- 
tended with  much  freedom  and  excessive  drunkenness : 

From  the  very  beginning,  effigies  of  the  most  revolting  indecency  are  set  up  in  the 
gates  of  the  town  and  in  the  principal  thoroughfares. 

Troops  of  men  and  women,  wreathed  with  flowers  and  drunk  with  bang,  crowd  the 
streets,  carrying  sacks  full  of  a  bright  red  vegetable  powder.  With  this  they  assail  the 
passers-by,  covering  them  with  clouds  of  dust,  which  soon  dyes  their  clothes  a  startling 
color.  Groups  of  people  stationed  at  the  windows  retaliate  with  the  same  projectile,  or 
squirt  with  wooden  syringes  red  and  yellow  streams  of  water  into  the  streets  below. 

The  Nautch  dances  reach  the  acme  of  voluptuousness,  and  the  accom- 
panying chants  are  filled  with  suggestiveness.  The  author  here  quoted 
says  that  Holica  was  the  Indian  Venus. 

An  eminent  authority  says  that — 

This  red  powder  (guliil)  is  a  sign  of  a  bad  design  of  an  adulterous  character.  During 
the  holi  holidays  the  Maharaj  throws  gulal  on  the  breasts  of  female  and  male  devotees, 
and  directs  the  current  of  some  water  of  a  yellow  color  from  a  syringe  upon  the  breasts 
of  females.  J 

This  "yellow  water"  maybe  a  survival  of  and  a  refinement  ujDon 
urine.  The  Apaches  and  Navajoes,  close  neighbors  of  the  Zunis,  have 
had,  until  very  recently  (and  may  still  celebrate),  the  Dance  of  the  Josh- 
k4n,  in  which  clowns  scatter  upon  the  spectators,  from  bladders  wound 
round  their  bodies,  water,  said  to  be  representative  of  urine. 

*Manicheans  bathed  in  urine.— (Picart,  Codtumes.  &c..  Dissertation  sur  les  Perses,  p.  18.) 
t  See  in  Rousselet's  "  India,"  London,  1876,  pp.  173, 343.    It  has  been  identified  as  our  April  Fool's 
Day.    See  in  "AsiaticResenrches,"CaIcutta,1790,  vol.2,  p.334;  also,  in  Moor's  "Hindu  Pantheon," 
London,  1810,  pp.  156,  157;  also,  tbe  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,  and  Appleton's  Encyclopsedia,  ar- 
ticle "April." 

On  the  Sunday  and  Monday  preceding  Lent  people  are  privileged  at  Lisbon  to  play  the  fool;  it 
is  thought  very  jocose  to  pour  water  on  any  person  who  passes  or  throw  powder  in  his  face;  but  to 
do  both  is  the  perfection  of  wit.— (Southey,  quoted  in  Hone's  Every  Day  Book,  vol.  1,  p.  206,  Lon- 
don, 1825.  See  Brand's  Popular  Antiquities,  London,  1849,  vol.  1,  p.  131,  article  "April  Fool's 
Day.") 

X  Inman,  Ancient  Faiths  Embodied  in  Ancient  Names,  p.  393. 


52  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES. 

Among  the  Aztecs  there  was  a  festival  allowing  the  fullest  license  to 
clowns,  armed  with  bladders,  filled  with  red  powder  or  fine  pieces  of  ma- 
guey paper,  attached  by  strings  to  short  poles.  With  these  bladders 
all  persons  caught  in  the  streets,  especially  women  and  girls,  were  merci- 
lessly buffeted.  (Sahagun,  vol.  2,  in  Kingsborough's  Mexican  Antiqui- 
ties, vol.  6,  p.  33,  and  again,  vol.  7,  p.  83.) 

His  account  says  that  in  the  seventeenth  month,  which  was  called  Tititl, 
and  corresponded  almost  to  our  winter  solstice,  the  Mexican  year  being 
divided  into  eighteen  months,  of  twenty  days  each,  beginning  with  our 
February,  the  Aztec  populace  played  a  game  called  "nechichiquavilo." 

All  the  men  and  boys  who  wished  to  play  this  game  made  little  bags 
or  nets,  filled  with  the  pollen  of  the  rush,  called  espadana,  or  with  paper 
cut  in  fine  pieces.  These  were  attached  to  cords  or  ribbons  half  a  yard 
long,  in  such  a  manner  that  a  blow  could  be  struck  with  them.  Others 
made  these  bags  like  gloves,  which  they  stuifed  as  above  stated,  or  with 
leaves  of  green  maize.  No  one  was  allowed,  under  penalty,  to  put  into 
these  bags  any  stones,  or  anything  else  which  could  hurt. 

The  boys  at  once  began  to  play  this  game,  in  the  way  of  a  sham-battle, 
hitting  each  other  on  the  head,  or  wherever  else  they  could.  As  the  fun 
increased,  the  more  mischievous  of  the  boys  began  to  beat  the  young 
maidens  passing  along  the  street ;  at  times,  three  or  four  young  boys 
would  attack  one  girl,  and  beat  her  so  hard  as  to  weary  her  and  make 
her  cry.  The  more  prudent  of  the  young  girls,  in  going  from  point  to 
point,  carried  a  club  with  which  to  defend  themselves.  Some  of  the  boys 
concealed  the  bag,  and  when  any  old  women  carelessly  approached, 
they  would  suddenly  begin  to  beat  them,  crying  out  "  Chichiquatzinte 
mantze,"  which  means  "Our  mother,  this  is  the  bag  of  the  game."* 

*  Para  este  juego,  todos  los  hombres  y  muchaehos  que  querian  jugar  hacian  taleguillas  6  redecillos 
Uenos  de  flor  de  las  espadanas  6  de  algunos  papeles  rotos ;  ataban  estos  con  unos  cordelejos  6  cin- 
tas  de  media  vara  de  largo,  de  tal  manera  que  pudiese  hacer  golpe  ;  otros  hacian  &.  manera  de  guan- 
tes  las  taleguillas  e  hinchabanlos  de  lo  arriba  dicho  6  de  ojas  de  maiz  verde ;  ponian  pena  ;1  todos 
estos  que  nadie  echase  piedra  6  cosa  que  pudiese  lastimar  dentro  las  taleguillos.  Comenzaban 
luego  los  inuchachos  d  jugar  este  juego  S  manera  de  escaramuza  y  dabansede  talegazos  en  laeabe- 
za  y  por  doride  acertaban  y  de  poco  en  poco  se  iban  multiplieando  de  los  muchaehos  y  los  mas 
traviesos  daban  de  talegazos  &,  las  muchaehos  que  pasaban  por  la  calle  :  &  las  veces,  se  juntaban  tres 
o  quatro  para  dar  it  yna  de  tal  manera  que  la  fatigaban  y  la  hacian  llorar. 

Algunos  muehachas  que  eran  mas  discretas,  si  habian  de  ir  ii  alguna  parte,  entonces  llevaban 
un  palo  ii  otra  cosa  que  hiciese  temer  para  defenderse.  Algunos  muchaehos  escondian  la  talega  y 
quando  pasaba  alguna  mujer  descuidadamente,  dabanla  de  talegazos  y  quando  la  daban  un  golpe, 
decian  Chichiquatzinto  mantze,  que  quiere  decir  "  Madre  Nuestra,  es  la  talega  de  este  juego."  Las 
mugeres  andaban  muy  recatadas  quando  ivan  a  alguna  parte.— (Sahagun,  in  Kingsborough.  vol  7, 
p.  83.) 

At  the  feast  of  the  goddess  Tona  the  same  game  was  played. — (See  Sahagun,  in  Kingsborough, 
vol.  6.  p.  33.) 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES.  53 

The  following  is  Torquemada's  description : 

In  the  festival  in  honor  of  the  goddess  Yamatecuhtli,  or  "principal  old  woman,"  in 
the  seventeenth  month  of  the  Mexican  calendar,  all  the  people  of  the  city  made  bags  after 
the  manner  of  purses,  and  stuffed  them  full  of  hay  and  straw  and  other  things  which 
would  have  no  weight  and  do  no  harm,  and,  attaching  them  to  a  cord,  carried  them  hid- 
den under  their  cloaks.  With  these  bags  they  buffeted  all  the  women  they  met  on  the 
streets. — (Torquemada,  Monarchia  Indiana,  lib.  10,  cap.  29.) 

He  recognizes  the  similarity  between  this  and  the  blind-man's-buff 
games  of  other  countries.* 

A  contributor  to  Asiatic  Kesearches  calls  this  powder  of  the  Huli  festi- 
val a  "  purple  powder,"  and  claims  that  the  idea  is  to  represent  the  return 
of  spring,  which  the  Romans  called  "  purple."  f 

In  the  report  of  one  of  the  early  American  explorations  to  the  Trans- 
Missouri  region  occurs  the  story  that  the  Republican  Pawnees,  Nebraska, 
once  (about  1780— '90)  violated  the  laws  of  hospitality  by  seizing  a  calu- 
met-bearer of  the  Omahas  who  had  entered  their  village,  and,  among 
other  indignities,  making  him  "  drink  urine  mixed  with  bison  gall."  | 

Bison  gall  itself  sprinkled  upon  raw  liver,  just  warm  from  the  carcass, 
was  regarded  as  a  delicacy.  The  expression  "  excrement  eater  "  is  applied 
by  the  Mandans  and  others  on  the  Upper  Missouri  as  a  term  of  the 
vilest  opprobrium,  according  to  Surgeon  Washington  Matthews,  §  U.  S. 
Army,  whose  remarks  are  based  upon  an  unusually  extended  and  intelli- 
gent experience. 

Doctor  Garrett  mentions  "  water  of  amber  made  by  Paracelsus  out  of 
cow  dung,"  and  gives  the  recipe  for  its  distillation,  as  well  as  for  that  of 
its  near  relative,  "water  of  dung,"  the  formula  for  which  begins  with 
the  words,  ''Take  of  any  kind  of  dung  you  please." || 

It  is  not  beyond  the  limit  of  probability  that  in  these  obsolete  medica- 
ments flicker  the  dying  flame  of.  the  idea  still  governing  the  Hindu 
woman  craving  the  joys  of  maternity. 

PHALLIC    SUPERSTITIONS    IN    FRANCE. 

And  in  like  manner,  as  has  already  been  shown  of  the  sacred  character 
attaching  among  the  people  of  the  far  East  to  water,  wine,  or  milk  which 

*  Hacia  toda  la  gente  de  el  Pueblo  unas  talegas,  &  manera  de  bolsas,  y  henchianles  de  heno  y  paja 
y  otras  cosas  que  no  hacen  golpe  ni  tienen  peso  y  colgavanlas  de  un  cordel  y  traianlas  escondidas 
debaio  de  las  mantos  que  les  Servian  de  capas.  Con  estos  talegas  daban  de  Talegafos  a  todas  las 
inugeres  que  encontraban  por  las  oolles. 

tR.  Patterson,  in  Asiatic  Researches,  Calcutta,  1805,  vol.  8,  p.  78. 

X  Long's  Expedition,  Philadelphia,  182.5,  vol.  1.  p.  300. 

2  Author  of  "Hidatsa,"  and  other  ethnological  works  of  authority. 

!i  Garrett,  Myths  in  Medicine,  New  York,  18.S4,  pp.  148,  149. 


54  URINE  DANCES  AND  UR-ORGIES. 

had  been  poured  over  the  Ungam,  the  women  of  France  solaced  them- 
selves with  the  hope  that  children  would  come  to  those  who  drank  an 
infusion  containing  scrapings  from  the  phalli,  existing  until  the  out- 
break of  the  French  revolution,  at  Puy  en  Velay,  in  the  church  of  Saint 
Foutin ;  in  the  shrine  of  Saint  Guerlichon,  near  Bruges ;  in  the  shrine 
of  Guignolles,  near  Brest ;  and  in  that  of  an  ancient  statue  of  Priapus, 
at  Antwerp.* 

CONCLUDING    REMARKS. 

The  resemblance  to  the  customs  of  the  East  Indies  was,  in  places, 
even  closer  than  as  above  indicated. 

Inman  tells  of  sterile  women  who  drank  "priapic  wine,"  i.  e.,  wine 
poured  upon  an  upright  conical  stone  representing  the  lingam,  and  then 
collected  and  allowed  to  turn  sour,  (Inman,  "Ancient  Faiths,"  &c.,  vol. 
•1,  p.  305,  article  ''Asher.") 

The  same  statement  is  to  be  found  in  Hargrave  Jennings'  work, 
''Phallicism,"  London,  1884,  p.  256,  but  it  seems  to  be  repeated  from 
Inman  and  Dulaure.  Campbell  reports  that  "among  the  principal  relics 
of  the  church  at  Embrun  was  the  statue  of  Saint  Foutin.  The  worship- 
ers of  this  idol  poured  libations  of  wine  upon  its  extremity,  which  was 
reddened  by  the  practice.  This  wine  was  caught  in  a  jar  and  allowed 
to  turn  sour.  It  was  then  called  'holy  vinegar,'  and  was  used  by  the 
women  as  a  lotion  with  which  to  anoint  the  yoni."  ("Phallic  Worship," 
Eobert  Allen  Campbell,  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  1888,  p.  197.) 

MEDICINAL    EFFECTS   OF    URINE. 

The  fullest  examination  possible  has  been  made  of  encyclopsedias  and 
medical  works  to  ascertain  the  effects  upon  the  human  system  of  urine 
swallowed  or  absorbed.     The  only  discovery  has  been  in  the  work  of 

*  See  Dulaure's  "  Des  Divinites  Generatrices,"  Paris,  1825,  pp.  271,  277,  278, 280,  and  283.  He  says 
that  this  vestige  of  phallic  worship  was  discernible  in  France  "a  une  epoque  tres-rapprochee  de 
la  notre,"  and  that  women  "  raclaient  une  enorme  branche  phallique  que  presentait  la  statue  du 
saint;  elles  croyaient  que  la  raclure  enfusee  dans  un  boisson,  les  rendrait  fecondes." 

But  Davenport,  who  has  probed  deeply  into  the  question  of  phallic  worship,  contends  that  such 
vestiges  existed  in  some  of  the  communities  of  France,  Sicily,  and  Belgium,  not  only  down  to  the 
Reformation,  but  even  to  the  opening  decades  of  the  19th  century.  (See  Davenport  "On  the 
Powers  of  Reproduction,"  London  (privately  printed),  1869,  pp.  10-20.) 

E.  Payne  Knight  speaks  of  this  same  instance  of  survival  at  Isernia,  in  Sicily.  It  was  known 
at  that  place  as  late  as  1805. 

See,  also,  "The  Masculine  Cross  and  Ancient  Sex  Worship,"  Sha  Rocco,  New  York,  1874,  &c. 

Dulaure,  however,  admits  that  he  knew  of  no  example  in  antiquity  of  scraping  the  phallus  and 
drinking  an  infusion  of  the  powder.  "L'usage  de  racier  le  phallus  et  d'avaler  de  cette  raclure 
avec  de  I'eau,  usage  dont  je  ne  connais  point  d'exemple  dans  I'antiquite." 

Dulaure,  as  above,  p.  300. 


URINE  DANCES  AND  UR- ORGIES.  55 

Surgeon  General  Hammond,  U.  S.  Army,*  A  chapter  is  devoted  to 
uraemic  intoxication  or  the  exhilaration  produced  by  the  entrance  into  the 
blood  of  urine,  either  injected  or  abnormally  absorbed.  This  part  of  the 
subject  should  be  carefully  scrutinized  by  medical  experts,  whose  deter- 
minations may  make  known  whether  or  not  the  drunken  frenzy  of  the 
Zuni  dancers  could  be  attributed  to  the  unnatural  beverage  exclusively 
or  to  that  in  combination  with  other  intoxicants. 

Only  such  matter  has  been  admitted  into  this  monograph  as  could  ^rima 
facie  be  considered  as  having  the  right  of  entry ;  the  greatest  care  has 
been  taken  to  avoid  distortion  or  mutilation  of  authorities,  and  much  has 
been  excluded  that  might  have  been  presented  without  running  a  risk  of 
being  accused  of  unfairness. 

For  example,  as  old  an  authority  as  John  de  Laet  calls  attention  to 
the  great  prevalence  of  intoxication  and  debauchery  among  the  Indians 
of  Vextipa,  near  Mexico,  who  on  feast  days  had  the  ancient  custom  of 
becoming  drunk  as  beasts  and  committing  enormous  excesses.f  And  in 
like  manner  the  first  missionaries  in  Canada  complained  of  the  brutal 
orgies  of  the  natives,  in  which,  under  cover  of  darkness  and  the  cloak  of 
their  superstitions,  deeds  were  committed  which  the  pen  dared  not  de- 
scribe. Ample  reference  to  these  has  been  preserved  in  the  Jesuit  rela- 
tions, and  in  the  exact  and  interesting  American  treatises  dependent  so 
largely  upon  them.  %  It  is  more  likely,  however,  that  the  Huron  and 
Algonkin  saturnalia  were,  in  general  terms,  scenes  of  promiscuous  licen- 
tiousness. 

Only  two  authorities  can  be  cited.  Fathers  Le  Jeune  and  Sagard,  who 
instance  the  use  of  human  urine  or  ordure  under  spiritual  direction ;  all 
others  leave  the  inference,  that  the  bacchanalia  of  which  they  were  the 
reluctant  and  disgusted  observers  had  no  other  peculiarity  than  that  of 
unrestrained  sexual  intercourse. 

To  confirm  the  testimony  previously  submitted  upon  the  phallic  origin 
of  the  custom  of  kissing  under  the  mistletoe,  the  deductions  of  a  recent 


*  Physiological  Memoirs,  New  York,  1863. 

i)«nglison  says :  "  Human  urine  was  at  one  time  considered  aperient ;  and  was  given  in  jaundice 
in  the  dose  of  one  or  two  ounces.  Cow's  urine,  urina  vaccac,  all-flower  water,  was  once  used  warm 
from  the  cow  as  a  purge."  — (Dunglison's  Medical  Dictionary,  Philadelphia,  Pa.,  1860,  article 
"Urine.") 

t  John  de  Laet,  lib.  vi,  chap,  vii,  p.  202. 

tSee  Francis  Parkman's  "Jesuits  in  North  America."  the  works  of  John  Gilmary  Shea,  and 
Kipp's  "Jesuit  Missions." 


56  URINE  DANCES  AND  UE-OEGIES. 

writer  merit  attention,  altliougli  they  came  too  late  for  incorporation  in 
their  proper  place: 

The  mistletoe  was  dedicated  to  Mylitta,  in  whose  worship  every  woman  must  once  in 
her  life  submit  to  the  sexual  embrace  of  a  stranger.  When  she  concluded  to  perform 
this  religious  duty  in  honor  of  her  acknowledged  deity,  she  repaired  to  the  temple  and 
placed  herself  under  the  mistletoe,  thus  offering  herself  to  the  first  stranger  who  solicited 
her  favors.  The  modern  modification  of  the  ceremony  is  found  in  the  practice  among 
some  peoi^le  of  hanging  the  mistletoe,  at  certain  seasons  of  the  year,  in  the  parlor  or 
over  the  door,  when  the  woman  entering  that  door,  or  found  standing  under  the  wreath, 
must  kiss  the  first  man  who  approaches  her  and  solicits  the  privilege. — ("Phallic  Wor- 
ship," Robert  Allen  Campbell,  C.  E.,  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  1888,  p.  202.) 

Keferring  to  previous  remarks,  on  page  37,  it  may  be  noted  that  a 
curious  instance  of  survival  by  contrariety  is  to  be  detected  in  what 
Picart  relates  of  the  Hebrew  ceremonial  of  the  present  day.  He  says 
of  the  behavior  of  the  Hebrew  while  praying,  that  he  should  carefully 
avoid  gaping,  spitting,  blowing  his  nose,  or  emitting  any  exhalations : 

n  doit  6viter  autant  qu'il  se  peut  de  bailler,  de  cracher,  de  se  moucher,  de  laisser  aller 
des  vents. — (Picart,  Coutumes  et  C6r6monies,  &c.,  vol,  1,  p.  126.) 

All  this  information  seems  to  be  taken  from  the  work  of  the  Kabbi 
Leon  of  Modena. 

In  the  above  are  seen  the  antipodes  of  the  practices  characteristic  of 
the  worship  of  Baal-Peor  which  the  prophets. had  so  much  trouble  in 
eradicating  from  the  minds  of  the  chosen  people. 


iaayiora  tsrea. 

Makers 
Syracuse.  N.  Y. 

PAT.  JAN.  21.  IMS 


DATE  DUE 

**■'-"-. 

^m^m^. 

nsw**^- 

,.^*N««* 

•JUiUsfi 

mimi^    ■ 

GAYLORD 

PRJNTED  IN  u    S    A. 

